LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

OIF^T  OF 


Ctes 


JESUS:   AN   UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 


mnf  mfejjeti  portrait 


By 

CHARLES  VAN  NORDEN 

D.D.,  LL.D. 

Author  of  "The  Outermost  Rim  and  Beyond,"  "The  Psychic 
Factor,  an  Outline  of  Psychology,"  etc. 


FUNK  &  WAGNALLS  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 

1906 


COPYRIGHT,  1906,  BY 

FUNK  &  WAGNALLS  COMPANY 

[Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America] 

Published,  February,  i()ob 


This  Volume  is  Dedicated 

to 
MY  WIFE 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction 1 

PART  FIRST 

THE  AUTHOR'S  POINT  OF  VIEW 

CHAPTER 

I.  The  Commonplace  Jesus 9 

II.  The  Occult  Jesus 17 

III.  The  Legendary  Jesus 26 

PART  SECOND 

HOW   JESUS   DISCOVERED   HIS   MISSION 

IV.  The  Environment 37 

V.  The  Self-Discovery 48 

VI.  The  Crisis  of  Decision 60 

VII.  The  Master's  Claims 72 

PART  THIRD 

WHAT   JESUS   TAUGHT 

VIII.  The  Message 93 

IX.  The  Message  Analyzed 103 

vii 


viii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

X.  The  Gate 130 

XI.  The  Way 137 

XII.  Life 142 

XIII.  The  Coming  Jesus 151 

XIV.  In  These  Teachings  Was  Jesus  a  Disciple 

of  Gautama  ? 155 

PART  FOURTH 

THE  MASTER'S  METHOD  AND  PERSONALITY 

XV.  The  Rhetoric  of  Jesus 169 

XVI.  Some  Personal  Characteristics  of  Jesus     .  187 
XVII.  The  Personality  of  Jesus  Shown  in  His 

Attitude  Toward  Institutions  ....  216 

PART  FIFTH 

REFLECTIONS 

XVIII.  The  Cost  of  Salvation, 231 

XIX.  Has  Jesus  Come  Again  ? 251 

XX.  Antichrist 258 

XXI.  The  Invisible  and  Universal  Kingdom     .  279 
XXII.  The  Unfinished  Jesus  .  292 


INTRODUCTION 

IT  was  Cassius,  in  the  play  of  Julius  Caesar, 
who  declared  to  Brutus: 

"I  had  as  lief  not  be,  as  live  to  be 
In  awe  of  such  a  thing  as  I  Myself!" 

Yet  the  lean  and  hungry  Cassius  had  been  no 
less  of  a  philosopher  for  awe  of  I  MYSELF. 
If  for  no  other  reason,  because  of  its  possi- 
bilities. In  Myself  lurks  at  least  the  poten- 
tiality of  genius;  and  genius  has  been  the  idol 
of  hero  worship,  the  playground  of  art,  and 
the  despair  of  science. 

History  has  been  redeemed  from  its  monot- 
onous story  of  greed,  violence,  vice,  and 
crime,  and  has  been  made  picturesque,  elo- 
quent, and  helpful  only  by  the  advent,  now 
and  then  and  here  and  there,  of — not  persons 
merely — but  personages,  of  Caesars — of  kings 
and  queens  who  came  by  right  divine — who 
in  the  plenitude  of  power  all  their  own,  have 


2  INTRODUCTION 

availed  their  fellow  men,  to  restate  knowledge, 
interpret  mystery,  abolish  time-honored  insti- 
tutions, and  transform  society. 

We  all  stand  in  awe  of  such  men  and  women. 
And  for  this  very  reason  we  fail  to  scrutinize 
them  closely  and  measure  them  accurately. 
Contemporaneous  observers  exalt  them:  pos- 
terity deifies  them.  The  flashing  of  their 
genius  out-dazzles  the  every-day  human  in 
them;  the  commonplace  being  in  them,  who 
ate,  drank,  and  slept,  who  caught  the  world's 
attention,  only  after  struggle,  who  like  count- 
less others  loved  and  hated,  sorrowed  and 
endeavored,  often  lost  heart  and  sometimes 
fell  short,  dies  with  their  mortality;  only  the 
exceptional  gifts,  which  perhaps  few  of  their 
neighbors  perceived,  have  won  immortality, 
and  these  are  now  exaggerated  and  glorified. 

It  is  too  easily  forgotten  or  ignored  by  the 
hero-worshiper,  that  little  credit  would  at- 
tach to  a  being  all  superhuman;  and  that  the 
greatness  of  any  personality  is  in  the  accom- 
plishment of  notable  results,  despite  earthly 
conditions  of  a  crippling  character.  It  is  the 


INTRODUCTION  3 

human  limitation  itself,  and  this  alone,  which 
makes  genius  in  a  man  wonderful. 

The  sublime  personality,  with  whose  char- 
acter, environment,  and  work  we  busy  our- 
selves in  this  treatise,  of  all  heroes  has  suffered 
most,  in  his  history  and  the  impression  he  has 
made  upon  men,  from  the  glare  of  his  own 
ethical  and  religious  grandeur;  and  in  the 
minds  of  countless  of  the  good  and  wise  his 
marvelous  genius  has  effaced  his  humanity, 
even  to  the  extent  of  rendering  any  discussions 
of  his  limitations,  however  reverent,  an  ap- 
parent sacrilege.  Mention  the  name  of  Jesus 
to  these,  and  they  think  only  of  supreme 
creative  power,  of  a  god-man  who  worked 
miracles  and  wrought  an  infinite  sacrifice; 
who,  though  poor,  untaught,  and  without 
political  influence,  social  standing,  armies,  or 
carnal  enforcements  and  allurements  of  any 
kind,  called  men  by  the  thousand  from  busi- 
ness and  pleasure  to  become  beggars  and,  per- 
chance, to  die  for  himself  and  his  teachings; 
who  awed  the  powerful,  confounded  the  wise, 


4  INTRODUCTION 

closed  and  sealed  an  ancient  religion,  estab- 
lished a  universal  faith,  and  turned  the  world 
upside  down. 

But  is  it  not  evident  that  were  Jesus  of 
Nazareth  an  entire  exception,  had  he  lived 
apart  from  the  ordinary  conditions  of  earthly 
existence,  and  were  we  forced  to  view  him  as 
only  a  diaphanous  apparition  of  the  Divine, 
a  splendid  theophany  or  a  veritable  god  in- 
carnate, there  could  be  no  occasion  for  critical 
treatment?  Deity  can  not  be  defined,  nor 
qualified,  nor  even  pictured,  by  the  human 
imagination;  and  the  impression  made  by 
Jesus  upon  any  human  intellect,  had  he  been  a 
Khrishna,  a  man-god  or  a  god-man,  could  only 
have  been  a  mere  sense  of  dazzling  effulgence, 
a  bewilderment  of  awe  and  wonder,  while  any 
scientific  handling  of  the  problem  would  be 
quite  out  of  the  question. 

Abundant  evidence  remains  that  there  was, 
back  of  the  hero,  a  commonplace  man,  a  Jesus 
of  the  village,  the  fields,  and  the  shops,  and 
no  estimate  of  his  nature  and  no  history  of 
his  career  can  be  anything  but  romance, 


INTRODUCTION  5 

which  does  not  start  out  from  the  human,  the 
daily,  and  the  limited  in  his  story,  and  which 
does  not  pursue  the  theme  with  reverence  for 
natural  and  spiritual  law,  with  fidelity  to  the 
canons  of  biographical  criticism,  and  with 
absolute  loyalty  to  the  truth. 

This  little  book  is  a  humble  attempt  along 
these  lines. 


PART  FIRST 

THE  AUTHOR'S  POINT  OF  VIEW 


CHAPTER  I 

THE    COMMONPLACE    JESUS 

WE  simply  begin  at  the  beginning,  when, 
in  endeavor  to  delineate  the  Master, 
we  start  out  with  the  Jesus  of  the  fields,  the 
village,  and  the  shop.  No  most  ardent  be- 
liever in  His  very  godhood  can  challenge  the 
fact  that  He  was  a  man  of  flesh  and  blood,  of 
thought  and  feeling,  of  action  and  passion, 
quite  like  His  neighbors.  His  annals  assure 
us  that  He  was  born  a  babe,  that  He  grew  as 
a  child,  that  He  matured  into  manhood,  that 
He  hungered  and  thirsted  even  after  His  resur- 
rection. He  walked,  He  grew  weary,  He  sat 
down,  He  reclined,  slept,  bled,  and  died. 
Nay,  we  may  justly  infer,  from  the  transfer- 
ence of  His  cross  on  the  fatal  morning  of  the 
crucifixion,  in  the  ascent  to  Golgotha,  from  His 
own  shoulders  to  those  of  a  peasant,  that  His 
physique  was  not  even  of  ordinary  robustness. 


10     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Had  His  personal  appearance  been  impres- 
sive for  peculiar  beauty,  or  had  he  varied  in  any 
marked  way  or  degree  from  His  kind,  in  aspect 
or  bearing,  it  is  all  but  certain  that  some  evi- 
dence of  this  must  have  survived.  The 
silence  of  the  annalists  seems  to  refute  the 
surmise  of  pious  sentiment,  that  a  Raphael  or 
a  Guido  would  have  been  delighted  to  sketch 
His  face  or  form,  or  that  a  Phidias  would 
gladly  have  preserved  His  figure  in  marble. 
Had  Jesus  been  gifted  with  extraordinary 
physical  attractiveness,  the  evangelists  would 
not  have  failed  to  disclose  somewhere,  if  only 
indirectly,  the  effect  of  this  charm  upon  friend 
and  foe.  Doubtless  He  had  that  beauty  of  ex- 
pression which  a  pure  and  sympathetic  nature 
ever  imparts  to  countenance,  gesture,  and 
movement;  and  we  have  evidence  of  a  certain 
majesty  of  mien,  the  natural  accompaniment 
of  intense  individuality  and  lofty  aims.  Be- 
yond this  He  must  be  deemed,  physically,  as 
not  above  the  average  Jew  of  His  day. 

The  mental  nature  of  Jesus  also  conformed 
to  the  intellectual  habitudes  of  His  race  and 


THE  COMMONPLACE  JESUS  11 

class.  He  used  the  vernacular,  with  its  char- 
acteristic ambiguities  and  idioms.  Thus  the 
meaning  of  John  3:  8,  "The  wind  (meuna) 
bloweth  where  it  listeth,  and  thou  hearest  the 
sound  thereof,  but  canst  not  tell  whence  it 
cometh,  and  whither  it  goeth;  so  is  every  one 
that  is  born  of  the  spirit  (^eD/ia),"  depends 
upon  the  Jewish  use  of  "ruah,"  the  Hebrew 
equivalent  of  the  Greek  word.  Ruah  in  He- 
brew meant  successively  breath,  wind,  spirit, 
Divine  Spirit;  and  the  saying  was  one  of 
those  earnest  plays  upon  words,  in  which  the 
Hebrew  prophets  delighted. 

Jesus  taught  by  fiction,1  by  irony,2  by  sar- 
casm,3 by  enigma,4  by  hyperbole,  by  denuncia- 
tion— all  figures  and  forms  of  speech  suggest- 
ing the  limitations  of  human  intelligence.  He 
perceived  with  attention,  and  mused  upon 
what  He  saw  (iffewpet).  He  seems  not  to  have 
frowned  upon  the  little,  transparent,  and  well- 
meant  artifices  of  social  courtesy,  and  in  the 
walk  to  Emmaus,  "He  made  as  if  He  would 

1  Luke  15:  11-32.  3  Luke  11:  48. 

2  Math.  15:  23,  24,  26.  4  Luke  20:  41-44. 


12     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

have  gone  further."  To  speak  mildly,  He 
evaded  His  brothers  in  the  matter  of  going 
up  to  Jerusalem  for  the  feast  of  Tabernacles.1 

At  times,  He  acted  reluctantly,  and  many 
think  that  He  spoke  with  annoyance  at  Cana, 
when  His  mother  suggested  that  He  should 
work  a  miracle  in  the  interest  of  the  general 
merriment. 

By  three  evangelists  He  is  described  as 
marveling,  though  on  but  two  occasions,  in 
the  one  instance  over  unusual  faith,  and  in  the 
other  over  unusual  unbelief.  Once  anger  is 
imputed  to  Him,2  but  the  circumstances  indi- 
cate righteous  indignation.  He  indulged  in 
personal  preferences,  as  in  the  case  of  Lazarus, 
John,  Mary,  and  Martha,  all  of  whom  He 
"loved."  He  was  so  human  that  He  was 
capable  of  loving  at  sight,  and  though  the 
object  of  His  sudden  liking  was  so  far  from 
being  in  full  sympathy  with  Him,  that  "  he  had 
great  possessions"  and  went  away  grieved.8 

His  pity  for  the  woes  of  men,  very  unusual 

1  John  7 :  8,  ovno  is  a  doubtful  reading,  see  verse  10. 
2 Mark  3:  5,  3Mark  10:  21,  22. 


THE  COMMONPLACE  JESUS  13 

in  intensity,  seemed  to  humanize  Him  in  an 
extraordinary  degree,  and  bring  Him  down 
out  of  the  lofty  heights  of  His  thinking,  dream- 
ing, and  aspiration,  into  the  sympathy  of  poor 
mortals;  compassion  preceded  His  coming  as 
a  fragrance  of  mercy,  it  formed  a  luminous 
atmosphere  that  accompanied  and  surrounded 
Him,  it  remained  after  He  had  gone,  like  the 
phosphorescence  in  the  wake  of  a  steamer 
traversing  a  midnight  ocean.  Every  wretched 
creature  felt  the  spell  of  His  nearness,  and 
murmured,  "Oh,  that  I  might  but  touch  the 
hem  of  His  garment!"1  And  all  this  was  true, 
not  because  He  was  so  divine,  but  because  He 
was  so  human. 

He  sighed,2  He  "sighed  deeply,"8  and  twice 
it  is  reported  that  He  groaned.4  He  cried  out 
in  agony:6  he  wept  at  the  tomb  of  Lazarus,  and 
over  Jerusalem,  and  in  Gethsemane.  In  the 
last-mentioned  place,  He  declared  Himself 
"exceeding  sorrowful  even  unto  death";  and 
the  intensity  of  the  agony  showed  itself  in 

1  Mark  3:10.       3  Mark  8:12.  '  Math.  27 :  50. 

2  Mark  7:  34.       4  John  11 :  33-38. 


14     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

sweat-drops  of  blood.  During  the  bodily  pain 
and  weakness  of  the  crucifixion,  for  a  moment 
He  fell  victim  to  despair,  and  cried  out,  "My 
God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ? " 
almost  immediately  recovering  himself  for  the 
last  words  of  faith:  "It  is  finished!  Father, 
into  Thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit." 

His  quotations  of  Old-Testament  Scripture 
form  an  interesting  study  in  point.  They 
were  from  memory,  and  He  seems  to  have 
exerted  no  supernatural  control  over  the  proc- 
esses of  recollection,  nor  much  less  attempted 
any  miraculous  restoration  of  original  read- 
ings. Compare  Math.  12:  18  with  Isaiah  42: 
1-4.  One  very  remarkable  quotation,  Luke 
11:  49,  can  not  even  be  identified  in  any  Old- 
Testament  writing,  and  was  apparently  a  fair 
summing  up  of  the  substance  of  many  pro- 
phetic utterances  of  a  class  heard  at  the  syna- 
gogue readings  and  preserved  in  memory. 

No  slightest  hint  in  the  Gospels  leads  us 
to  conclude  that  Jesus  possessed  any  unusual 
technical,  artistic,  or  scientific  information, 
nor  that  he  anticipated  any  future  discoveries 


Of  THE 

UNIVERSITY 


THE  COMMONPLACE  JESUS 

in  mechanics,  physics,  medicine,  political 
economy,  or  even  Biblical  criticism.  Indeed, 
there  are  indications  that  His  scientific  infor- 
mation was  not  above  that  of  His  time.1 

There  are  none  but  speculative  reasons  for 
inferring  that  He  questioned  the  current  de- 
monology,  as  explanatory  of  hysteria,  epi- 
lepsy, idiocy,  and  mania.  He  addressed  de- 
mons as  though  they  were  personal  beings,2 
and  conversed  with  them  and  cast  them  out. 
He  spoke,  without  interrogation,  of  the  Devil 
and  of  his  angels,  of  Satan,  and  of  the  Prince 
of  this  world.  Of  a  woman,  who  had  been 
bowed  together  and  could  in  no  wise  lift  her- 
self, he  queried:  "Ought  not  this  woman, 
.  .  .  whom  Satan  hath  bound,  Lo!  these 
eighteen  years  .  .  .  ?"  He  also  believed  in 
the  prevalent  doctrine  of  guardian  angels 
(see  Math.  18:  10). 

Moreover,  no  scriptural  grounds  whatever 
can  be  discovered  for  supposing  that  He  re- 

1  Math.  5:  13  and  13:  32. 

2  Math.  17:  18,  Luke  8:  30,  Math.  13:  39,  and  John  8:  44, 
and  Math.  25:  41. 


16     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

jected  or  modified  the  Biblical  criticism,  such 
as  prevailed  in  His  day.  Severely  as  he  re- 
flected upon  the  follies  of  rabbinical  tradition, 
the  popular  veneration  for  the  "Holy  Scrip- 
tures," as  well  as  the  subservient  literalism  of 
the  learned  exegetes  of  the  times,  remained 
unchallenged.  He  evinced  no  modifying 
knowledge  of  geology  or  astronomy;  while  of 
the  prehistoric  man,  of  elementary  documents 
in  the  Pentateuch,  of  chronological  errors  in 
the  old  records,  of  scholastic  interpolations, 
and  text  variations  in  Holy  Writ,  there  is  left 
us  no  hint  in  all  His  teachings.  He  alluded 
to  the  Scriptures  quite  in  the  method  of  Peter 
and  of  James,  of  Shammai  and  of  Hillel;  and 
His  references  were  without  qualifications  to 
Adam  and  to  Abel,  to  Job,  to  Moses,  and  to 
Jonah.  He  believed  that  Jonah  abode  three 
days  in  the  whale's  belly,  and  that  Lot's  wife 
was  turned  to  salt  (Luke  17:  32). 

We  conclude,  then,  that  there  was  a  common- 
place Jesus,  a  creature  of  bone,  muscle,  and 
nerve,  far  from  robust — like  an  incandescent 
electric  lamp,  a  soul  of  light  in  a  body  of  glass. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  OCCULT  JESUS 

HPHE  personality  of  the  prophet  Jesus, 
wonderful  and  powerful  as  it  was, 
might  have  utterly  failed  to  make  any  lasting 
impression  upon  the  gross  age  in  which  He 
lived  had  He  not  been  capable  of  certain 
activities  of  an  unusual  kind,  which  fixed  the 
attention  of  the  thoughtless,  awed  the  mighty, 
and  impressed  the  simple. 

Indeed,  His  "works,"  in  the  sight  of  his 
contemporaries,  were  far  more  significant  than 
His  "words."  A  recent  and  more  thoughtful 
age  has  reversed  this  verdict,  and  were  it  not 
for  the  words  would  reject  the  works  alto- 
gether. As  a  matter  of  fact,  both  are  needed 
to  explain  the  historical  Jesus.  That  He 
wrought  "signs  and  wonders"  was  as  neces- 
sary a  part  of  His  mission  as  that  He  should 
"speak  as  never  man  spake."  That  an  igno- 

2  17 


18     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

rant  and  credulous  age  should  pronounce  His 
mighty  works  miracles  was  inevitable,  and 
that  a  skeptical  modern  era  of  induction  and 
experimentation  should  declare  those  ancient 
stories  of  triumph  over  ordinary  conditions 
the  legendary  growths  of  after  times,  is  also 
quite  to  have  been  expected.  But  neither  the 
former  superstition  nor  the  recent  skepticism 
has  rightly  interpreted  the  facts. 

The  commonplace  Jesus  would  never  have 
attracted  historical  notice  had  there  not  been 
in  Him  psychic  gifts  stirring  in  men  venera- 
tion for  an  occult  Jesus. 

Let  us  briefly  sum  up  these  signs  and  won- 
ders as  recorded. 

Jesus  is  said  to  have  discerned  the  minds  of 
men;  or,  as  this  age  would  express  it,  He  was 
gifted  in  "mind-reading."  The  fourth  gospel 
declares  of  Him,  that  "He  knew  men  and 
needed  not  that  any  should  testify  of  man; 
for  He  knew  what  was  in  man."  This  insight 
was  extraordinary:  He  searched  the  heart  of 
the  Samaritan  woman  at  the  well  of  Jacob, 
and  her  present  social  status  and  past  history 


THE  OCCULT  JESUS  19 

were  an  open  book  to  His  all-seeing  eye.  The 
character  and  mood  of  Zaccheus  were  revealed 
to  an  upward  glance,  as  the  Master  passed 
under  a  sycamore  tree  at  Jericho;  the  treach- 
ery of  Judas  was  in  vain  concealed  from  Him 
(Math.  26:  25);  Simon  Peter,  and  all  the  dis- 
ciples, were  the  objects  of  a  scrutiny  which 
would  have  been  uncanny,  in  its  marvelous 
penetration,  but  for  its  spirit  of  love  and 
benevolence  (Luke  22:  31).  Easily  he  pene- 
trated the  motives  of  his  opponents,  as  the 
evangelists  frequently  assure  us.  In  short,  he 
was  telepathic. 

Moreover,  He  was  endowed  with  that  re- 
markable vision  of  things  far  away — past, 
present,  and  future — which  psychologists  name 
lucidity,  and  which  in  common  parlance  is 
called  clairvoyance.  He  saw  Nathaniel,  afar, 
under  the  fig-tree,  and  He  read  the  character 
and  history  of  the  distant  stranger,  whom  He 
had  never  known  in  the  ordinary  way,  accu- 
rately. During  a  dark  night,  from  the  shore, 
He  "saw"  the  disciples  toiling  at  the  oar  in 
a  boat  on  the  heaving  sea  of  Galilee.  At  a 


20     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

distance,  and  without  tidings,  He  knew  that 
Lazarus  lay  stricken  and  entombed.  Fore- 
sight of  coming  events  was  a  frequent  expe- 
rience: He  predicted  Peter's  downfall,  His 
own  death  and  resurrection,  the  persecution 
of  the  disciples,  the  fate  of  individual  fol- 
lowers, the  destruction  of  the  Temple,  the 
overthrow  and  annihilation  of  Jerusalem,  the 
end  of  the  world  (aeon,  age),  the  coming  of  a 
Divine  Comforter,  the  election  of  the  Gen- 
tiles, the  completion  of  His  work  in  a  certain 
Coming,  and  a  final  Judgment.  That  He 
foresaw  the  entire  future,  is  not  only  not 
asserted,  but  denied,  and  his  prevision,  like 
that  of  other  clairvoyants,  appears  to  have 
been  occasional,  incidental,  and  incomplete. 

His  works  of  healing  were  innumerable  and 
incessant.  Hysterics,  epileptics,  idiots,  mani- 
acs, the  deaf,  the  blind,  the  dumb,  the  para- 
lytic, the  halt,  the  exhausted — all  responded 
to  His  power  in  recovery  from  their  peculiar 
ills,  in  cures  that  amazed  and  thrilled  the 
multitude.  Sometimes  this  was  done  by  a 
mere  word,  sometimes  it  required  touch,  and 


THE  OCCULT  JESUS  21 

in  a  few  cases  there  was  appearance  of  reme- 
dial agency  (Mark  6 :  56,7:  33,8:  22-25;  John 
9:  6,  7),  but  there  are  no  recorded  failures. 

All  this  was  of  course  pronounced  miracu- 
lous in  the  days  of  the  Roman  emperors.  It 
is  every- day  science  now.  Workers  in  the 
various  societies  of  psychical  research,  in 
many  countries,  under  supervision  of  some  of 
the  most  able  scientists  of  to-day,  are  reducing 
to  law,  that  is,  to  generalized  statement — for 
laws  are  only  generalized  results  of  experience, 
brief  statements  of  discovered  relationships 
between  groups  of  facts — these  seemingly  un- 
canny and  lawless  outbreaks  of  human  intelli- 
gence. Telepathy  and  lucidity  are  now  well 
proven  facts;  and  it  begins  to  appear  that  they 
are  universal  gifts,  more  or  less  latent  how- 
ever, in  most  persons. 

The  mental  cure  of  disease,  involving  great 
power  of  mind  over  body,  must  now  be  recog- 
nized by  all  thoughtful  and  observant  persons, 
as  a  well-attested  fact,  under  certain  condi- 
tions. Doubtless  much  rubbish  is  represented 
in  the  pretensions  of  the  "faith  cure,"  the 


22     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

"mind  cure,"  and  "Christian  science;"  but 
there  is  now  shown  to  be  a  basis  of  truth  in 
their  claims.  Even  the  "  miracles  "  of  Lourdes, 
of  Holywell,  and  other  shrines  are  not  fabrica- 
tions, and  the  ministrants  of  these  sacred 
places  are  by  no  means  impostors.  Moreover, 
any  one,  skilful  in  hypnotic  control,  can  exor- 
cise headaches,  toothaches,  almost  any  ache, 
and  even  hypochondria  and  drunkenness. 
The  human  soul  is  a  vast  thesaurus  of  possi- 
bilities very  little  explored.  It  is  well  to  re- 
member that  it  was  Voltaire,  prince  of  skeptics, 
who  declared:  "It  takes  twenty  years  to  bring 
man  from  the  state  of  embryo,  and  that  of  mere 
animal,  to  the  point  when  his  reason  begins  to 
dawn.  It  has  taken  thirty  centuries  to  know 
his  structure.  It  would  take  eternity  to  know 
something  of  his  soul." 

Out  of  the  superstition,  self-deception,  and 
knavery  of  ages,  begins  to  emerge  a  psychol- 
ogy large*  enough  to  comprehend  even  Jesus 
of  Nazareth. 

There  is  every  historical  reason  to  ascribe 
to  Jesus  great  psychic  power,  and  there  is  no 


THE  OCCULT  JESUS  23 

reason  for  denying  Him  gifts  which,  in  the  eyes 
of  contemporaries,  established  Him  as  an  oc- 
cult being  superior  to  nature  and  in  complete 
touch  with  the  mysterious  forces  which  over- 
ruled the  world. 

That  He  wrought  miracles,  no  man  in  His 
time  could  doubt,  and  no  intelligent  person 
need  to-day  affirm.  He  found  Himself  a 
psychic  of  high  degree,  and  used  His  most 
unusual  gifts  for  the  good  of  the  people. 

That  He  did  heal  the  sick  and  verily  cast 
out  devils — or  what  seemed  such  in  those  days 
—and  that  He  performed  many  wonderful 
works,  then,  we  feel  constrained  to  admit  as 
scientifically  allowable  and  as  historically 
proven ;  and  in  that  very  situation  we  perceive 
large  explanation  of  the  success  of  His  mission. 

That  the  Master  understood  the  scope  and 
significance  of  His  own  psychic  powers  we 
can  not  insist;  that  the  credulous  popular  ex- 
planations of  His  works  were  His  own  inter- 
pretation of  Himself,  we  are  far  from  declar- 
ing; that  He  ever  resorted  to  trickery  to  win 
applause,  to  eke  out  His  gifts,  or  even  to  gain 


24     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

a  reasonable  hearing,  we  utterly  refuse  to 
believe,  as  inconsistent  with  His  character 
and  general  conduct. 

The  hypothesis  of  Spiritualism,  now  current, 
that  He  was  a  great  Medium  and  had  converse 
with  "controls,"  who  gave  Him  assistance 
from  another  world,  was  practically  the  theory 
of  His  enemies  in  His  own  day,  who  charged 
that  He  cast  out  devils  by  Beelzebub,  the 
prince  of  the  devils,  or  some  other  unclean 
spirit.  This  charge  seemed  to  Him,  although 
He  believed  in  demonology,  the  grossest  blas- 
phemy. He  was  helped,  He  admitted,  but  by 
the  Holy  Spirit  of  the  Most  High;  and  to 
ascribe  His  power  to  lower  agency  was  def- 
amation of  the  Deity,  so  atrocious,  that  of  all 
sins  it  alone  could  hope  for  no  forgiveness. 
To  His  own  view,  Jesus  was  in  this  regard  a 
soul  inspired,  and  His  works  were  possible  to 
Him  only  through  the  efficacy  of  a  life  of  sin- 
gular purity  and  constant  fasting  and  prayer 
(Mark  9:  29). 

As  we  shall  see,  the  Occult  Jesus  explains 
the  Messianic  Jesus:   His  signs  and  miracles 


THE  OCCULT  JESUS  25 

formed  an  essential  element  not  only  in  the 
success  of  His  life  and  message,  but  no  less  in 
His  own  unfolding  religious  consciousness. 

It  must  not  be  inferred  that  these  signs  and 
wonders  served  the  Master  as  credentials  of 
office  for  us,  or  as  evidence  of  a  divine  mission 
for  this  age,  for  He  was  by  no  means  alone 
even  in  the  exalted  possession  and  exercise  of 
psychic  gifts.  His  own  disciples  and  many 
men  have  healed  the  sick,  "cast  out  devils," 
and  done  very  strange  things.  While  signs 
and  wonders  were  the  necessary  emphasis 
upon  His  ministration  of  mercy  in  a  crass, 
brutal  age,  they  are  for  us  a  pictorial  illustra- 
tion of  the  Gospel  message.  That  He  Him- 
self attached  no  exaggerated  value  to  His 
mysterious  powers,  in  comparison  with  graces 
of  character  and  the  potency  of  a  consecrated 
personality,  appears  in  His  warning  to  the 
Seventy  when  they  came  back  from  their 
mission  exulting  over  their  ability  to  cast  out 
demons:  "Notwithstanding,  in  this  rejoice  not, 
that  the  spirits  are  subject  unto  you,  but  rather 
rejoice  that  your  names  are  written  in  Heaven ! " 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  LEGENDARY  JESUS 

fFHE  psychic  gifts'  ascribed  to  Jesus  and 
alluded  to  in  the  last  chapter,  by  no 
means  exhaust  the  wonders  of  the  Biblical 
record.  Much  more  remarkable  manifesta- 
tions of  personal  power  and  privilege  than  the 
facts  of  mind-reading,  lucidity,  and  healing, 
which  we  have  admitted,  were  ascribed  to  the 
Prophet  of  Nazareth  by  all  the  evangelists. 
We  are  assured  that  Jesus  could  convey  Him- 
self through  multitudes,  with  inference  of  His 
temporary  invisibility,  as  at  Nazareth  and 
Jerusalem.  He  turned  water  into  wine  at 
Cana  in  Galilee.  He  multiplied  loaves  and 
fishes;  by  a  few  words  of  rebuke  He  stilled  a 
tempest;  He  walked  upon  waves.  Much 
more,  He  raised  the  dead, — Jairus's  daughter, 
the  son  of  the  widow  at  the  gate  of  Nain,  and 
Lazarus.  After  His  resurrection  He  appeared 

26 


THE  LEGENDARY  JESUS  27 

and  vanished  at  will,  in  the  manner  of  appari- 
tions; and  it  was  the  tradition  of  the  early 
Church,  based  on  the  testimony  of  eye-witness- 
es, that  at  last  He  floated  up  heavenward, 
disappearing  finally  from  earth,  like  Elijah, 
by  ascension. 

These  allegations  seem  to  bring  us  out  of 
the  realm  of  mere  psychic  potency  into  a 
region  of  tradition,  myth,  and  legend ;  and  we 
are  constrained  to  recognize  the  fact  that  the 
story  of  His  life — the  more  naturally  so  because 
of  its  just  claim  to  unusual  gifts — fell,  per- 
force, subject  to  those  modifications  which 
love,  zeal,  and  simple-mindedness  in  a  credu- 
lous age  rendered  inevitable. 

Nor  are  we  justified  in  deeming  such  infer- 
ence either  improbable  in  itself  or  belittling  to 
the  credibility  of  the  narrative,  in  view  of  the 
fact  that  all  ancient  literature  and  even  sober- 
est histories  entirely  free  from  the  bias  of 
strong  emotions,  suffered  such  poetic  distor- 
tion. The  admission  no  more  invalidates  the 
account  as  a  whole,  and  no  more  prevents  us 
from  a  just  weighing  of  the  real  facts,  than 


28     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

does  similar  high  coloration  render  worthless 
the  histories  of  Livy  and  Herodotus,  the  books 
of  Kings,  or  the  Saxon  Chronicle.  It  was 
inevitable  that  faith,  devotion,  credulity,  igno- 
rance, and  superstition  should  have  combined 
and,  without  fraudulent  intent,  to  add  much 
to  the  actual  occurrences  of  the  Master's  his- 
tory. 

Moreover  some  events,  of  a  startling  nature, 
may  have  been  credulously  but  honestly  mis- 
interpreted, as  the  story  of  the  Temptation 
and  the  "vision"  of  the  Transfiguration.  It 
is  not  improbable  that  the  raising  of  dead  per- 
sons to  life  again  may  have  been  only  a  clair- 
voyant perception  of  trance,  simulating  and 
mistaken  for  death,  and  that  the  event  was  a 
psychic  awakening  of  dreamers;  indeed,  hints 
of  this  are  to  be  found  in  the  stories  of  the 
raising  of  both  Jairus's  daughter  and  of  Laz- 
arus (Luke  8:  52,  John  11:  11). 

At  one  point  in  the  Biblical  narrative,  the 
critic  is  justified  in  boldly  abandoning  the 
attitude  of  caution,  and  in  appealing  to  the 
well-known  legendary  and  mythical  tendencies 


THE  LEGENDARY 

of  the  human  mind,  to  explain  otherwise 
incredible  averments.  We  allude  to  the  Im- 
maculate Conception,  and  to  occurrences 
associated  with  the  Birth.  That  these  beauti- 
ful portrayals  lend  themselves  not  only  to  the 
loftiest  spirituality  but  also,  and  in  the  highest 
degree,  to  artistic  treatment,  the  whole  history 
of  the  Church  and  of  medieval  architecture 
and  painting  testifies.  But  they  are  what 
must  have  arisen  at  that  early  period,  as  the 
apotheosis  of  the  Founder  proceeded  in  the 
Apostolic  Church,  and  as  the  once  living  and 
real  Prophet  became  more  and  more  a  type, 
an  ideal,  the  crystallizing  center  of  an  elaborate 
system  of  dogmatics.  These  legends  added 
impressiveness  to  the  sacred  memories,  justi- 
fied the  growing  claims,  and  were  not  so  much 
deliberately  invented  as  presupposed  of  neces- 
sity. 

Jesus  must  be  shown  to  have  descended 
from  David;  and  Matthew  and  Luke  secured 
the  needed  genealogy,  each  by  his  own  method, 
both,  possibly,  with  correctness.  Jesus  must 
appear  as  far  more  than  any  mere  prophet, 


30     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

and  rather  as  a  theophany,  or  a  Divine 
Emanation;  and  if  He  were  to  be  born  as  a 
man  at  all,  there  was  but  the  method  of  Im- 
maculate Conception.  That  this  involved  the 
Apostolic  Church  in  falsehood,  no  one  who 
has  studied  the  rise  of  myths  and  legends  will 
admit.  A  myth  or  a  legend  is  not  the  growth 
of  falsehood  but  of  imagination,  of  popular 
thought,  of  popular  dreams,  of  popular  yearn- 
ings— it  is  born  of  the  foam  on  the  waves  of 
a  great  sea,  no  one  knows  how  or  where,  and 
takes  such  shape  as  the  thoughtfulness  of  the 
poetry  of  the  age  conceiving  it  can  give. 

But  in  this  judgment  we  are  not  guided 
solely  by  general  considerations,  our  position 
is  supported  by  sound  Biblical  criticism. 
Apart  from  the  inherent  improbability  of  the 
alleged  events  of  the  Nativity,  and  apart  from 
the  inevitability  of  the  rise  of  some  such 
"dawn  rose"  in  the  early  morning  of  Chris- 
tianity, the  absence  of  any  allusion  to  the 
infancy  of  Jesus  in  the  ancient  gospel  of 
Mark,  is  fatal  to  the  credibility  of  the  beau- 
tiful proems  in  the  gospels  of  Matthew  and 


THE  LEGENDARY  JESUS  31 

Luke.  Moreover,  Jesus  Himself  emphati- 
cally rebuked  the  first  outbreak  of  Mariolatry 
when,  as  an  over-zealous  woman  lifted  up  her 
voice  and  blessed  His  mother  (not,  be  it  ob- 
served, because  of  her  personal  merit,  but 
because  she  had  borne  and  suckled  him),  He 
sternly  replied,  "Yea,  rather,  blessed  are  they 
that  hear  the  Word  of  God,  and  keep  it!" 
Nor  is  there  recorded  any  reference  by  the 
Master  to  a  remarkable  infancy. 

Indeed,  is  it  not  evident  that  the  stories  of 
the  Annunciation,  Conception,  and  Birth  of 
Jesus  rather  detract  from  than  add  to  the  value 
of  His  work,  and  that  they  belittle  His  person- 
ality ?  That  as  a  man,  born  of  a  woman,  He 
is  more  impressive  and  admirable  than  as  a 
theophany  or  a  Divine  Emanation,  must  ap- 
pear to  any  one  not  prejudiced  by  theological 
training  and  not  under  the  spell  of  ecclesias- 
tical legend. 

It  is  the  common  mistake  of  primitive  poetry 
to  render  heroes  impressive  by  giving  them  in- 
vulnerability, or  the  assistance  of  gods,  fairies, 
or  magicians.  Achilles  could  be  wounded 


32     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

only  in  the  foot,  King  Arthur  wielded 
an  Excalibur  forged  on  a  mystic  isle.  One 
ancient  hero  had  a  diamond  shield,  another 
a  corselet  which  could  not  be  pierced,  another 
a  magic  coat  of  mail— or  Mars,  or  Venus, 
or  fairies,  or  magicians  run  to  his  help  when 
in  danger.  But  the  more  mature  judgment 
of  later  times  always  perceives  that  victory  is 
not  great  when  inevitable,  with  no  chances  for 
the  adversary,  and  that  the  man  who  tri- 
umphs over  his  own  weakness,  as  well  as  over 
his  foe,  is  the  only  valiant  warrior.  We  now 
see  what  Jesus  most  clearly  perceived,  that 
to  rise  above  earthly  feebleness  of  body  and 
will,  and  to  become  wise,  strong,  beloved,  and 
influential,  despite  limitations,  marks  a  greater 
hero  far  than  any  Achilles  or  King  Arthur. 

It  was  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world 
that  an  Apostolic  Age  should  have  dreamed 
the  vision  of  the  Nativity  and  that  after- 
periods  should  have  idealized  this  still  further 
on  canvas  and  stone;  and  no  less  inevitable 
was  it  that  our  own  critical  age  should  reject 
it,  as  not  only  improbable  and  as  not  consist- 


THE  LEGENDARY  JESUS  33 

ent  with  the  narratives  themselves  and  the 
teachings  of  the  Master,  but  much  more  be- 
cause unworthy  of  Him. 

The  Resurrection  of  Jesus  stands  on  quite 
another  footing.  That  He  should  have  ap- 
peared after  death,  in  apparition,  again  and 
again,  may  also  be  legendary,  but  it  is  sus- 
tained by  testimony,  and  in  view  of  recent 
discoveries  in  Psychic  Research  not  to  be 
pronounced  as  beyond  the  natural  possibili- 
ties. 


PART  SECOND 

HOW  JESUS  DISCOVERED  HIS  MISSION 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  ENVIRONMENT 

HHHE  Hebrew  language  was  largely  made 
up  of  verbs,  as  Herder  put  it,  "a  very 
abyss  of  verbs,  a  sea  of  waves,  where  action 
rolls  surging  into  ever  new  action." 

The  history  of  the  Hebrews  had  been  an 
epic  poem,  all  emotion  and  movement,  and 
the  speech  expressed  the  national  character. 
Hence  the  many  thrilling  episodes  and  sublime 
personalities  in  the  memory  of  the  people. 
Back  of  every  Jew  loomed  up  gigantic  figures 
of  the  remote  past — heroes,  prophets,  kings, 
a  Moses,  an  Elijah,  a  David — who  had  been 
faithful  to  Jehovah  and  loyal  to  the  guidance 
of  the  Spirit,  in  life  and  unto  death.  For 
such  people  to  believe  in  a  spiritual  Deity,  a 
Divine  Law,  and  an  inspired  life  was  to  be 
themselves  inspired,  and  to  walk  in  the  path 
of  the  just.  Those  heroes  had  given  all  for 

37 


38     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  glory  of  their  people,  the  triumph  of  their 
religion,  and  the  name  of  their  God.  Pic- 
turesque, majestic,  heroic,  they  passed  by  in 
lordly  procession  before  the  imagination  of 
every  devout  and  patriotic  youth,  some  bear- 
ing rolls,  some  girded  with  swords,  some 
carrying  harps,  some  wearing  crowns,  but  all 
Jehovah's  Chosen,  His  prophets,  His  war- 
riors, His  poets,  and  His  kings.  Their  advent 
had  marked  for  mankind  and  for  human  his- 
tory the  most  complete  religious  enlightenment 
the  world  had  known.  No  nation  had  en- 
joyed such  a  past,  and  the  youth  of  no  land 
had  received  any  such  inspiration  to  spiritual- 
ity and  heroism. 

But  all  that  had  occurred  long  ago,  in  the 
rosy  dawn  of  Hebrew  faith,  and  was  now  but 
national  tradition,  nursery  prattle,  and  vivid 
text  for  the  homilies  of  the  scribes  in  the 
synagogues.  Judea  had  undergone  the  in- 
evitable reaction  from  prolonged  sublimity 
of  thought  and  conduct.  This  was  to  have 
been  expected  and  concerns  our  theme. 

It  is  the  tendency  of  mankind,  even  after 


THE  ENVIRONMENT  39 

the  greatest  religious  awakenings,  to  relapse 
into  formal  worship  and  innate  faith.  Relig- 
ion is  always  and  everywhere  in  danger  of 
becoming  largely  a  matter  of  instinct,  of  acci- 
dental surrounding,  of  indifference  and  preju- 
dice. People  may  follow  the  traditions  of 
their  fathers,  listen  patiently  to  their  ordained 
instructors,  read  devoutly  their  sacred  books, 
and  even  go  through  the  forms  of  what  seems 
to  them  decent  worship,  without  at  all  coming 
under  the  power  of  a  living  faith.  Belief,  in 
this  case,  becomes  a  habit,  a  formula,  a  prat- 
tle; it  fails  to  challenge  investigation  or 
awaken  doubt.  At  any  period  of  history  may 
be  observed  somewhere  this  decadence  of 
faith. 

To  illustrate,  take  the  Mohammedans  of  the 
present  time,  of  whom  there  are  no  fewer  than 
one  hundred  and  twenty  millions;  they  be- 
lieve in  Allah,  in  Mohammed,  and  in  the 
Koran;  they  cherish  in  their  holiest  shrine 
the  green  flag  of  the  prophet,  on  which  is 
written,  "The  Gates  of  Paradise  are  under 
the  shadow  of  swords,"  and  "Then  may  no 


40     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

man  give  nor  receive  mercy."  They  believe 
that  all  the  unfaithful  are  to  be  tortured  in  a 
pot  of  flames,  and  that  whoso  endure,  espe- 
cially such  as  die  bravely  in  battle,  are  to  abide 
forever  in  a  paradise  of  surpassing  loveliness, 
where  every  appetite  and  desire  shall  be 
indulged  without  stint  and  without  surfeit; 
they  hold  to  the  ultimate  triumph  of  their 
cause  and  it  is  highly  probable  that  many  of 
them,  were  the  issue  forced,  would  die  for 
their  faith.  Thus,  theoretically,  Mohamme- 
danism is  a  religion  of  action  and  aggression. 
And  there  was  a  time  when  fierce  sons  of  the 
desert,  their  ancestors  and  predecessors,  made 
the  world  turn  pale  at  terror  of  their  war-cry, 
but  that  was  when  their  faith  was  keener  than 
their  scimitars  and  more  repellent  than  their 
coats  of  mail.  Now  for  ages  the  soldiers  of 
the  prophet  have  been  content  to  be  left  merely 
unmolested,  the  green  banner  of  the  Crescent 
remains  furled  in  its  holy  place,  and  the 
scimitar  is  drawn  only  to  murder  Christian 
peasants,  to  chastise  unruly  Kurds,  and  to 
repel  invasion  of  Cossack  and  Russian.  The 


THE  ENVIRONMENT  41 

Islam  plaster  on  the  ceiling  of  the  great  mosque 
at  Constantinople — formerly  the  Christian 
church  of  Santa  Sophia — has  in  places  crum- 
bled off,  revealing  the  texts  that  once  beautified 
it  as  a  cathedral  of  the  Cross;  and  the  faithful 
are  said  to  be  awaiting  the  fulfilment  of  an 
old  prophecy,  foretelling  the  coming  of  the 
White  Czar  to  water  his  horses  beneath  the 
splendid  dome.  The  Sultan,  who  calls  him- 
self the  Padishah  of  all  the  believing,  always 
has  ready  at  the  water-gate  of  his  royal  palace 
a  yacht  equipped  for  speedy  flight  into  Asia; 
and  lo!  the  one  hundred  and  twenty  millions 
fold  their  hands  and  murmur,  "Great  is  God! 
God's  will  be  done!" 

Or,  ponder  the  Buddhism  of  to-day:  it  is 
in  like  manner  and  measure  heartless  and 
lifeless.  We  see  hundreds  of  millions  of  our 
fellow  men  practising  a  faith  of  much  elabo- 
rateness, which  has  gone  through  a  great  his- 
tory. Once  it  lived  and  breathed,  spoke  and 
grew;  but  now  it  is  moribund,  it  prays  by 
water-power,  reads  its  Bible  by  revolving  a 
cylinder  in  which  are  the  sacred  writings,  and 


42     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

mutters  and  begs — mere  inherited  habit,  in- 
stinct become  prejudice. 

The  epoch  of  the  appearance  of  Jesus  was 
in  such  an  age  of  religious  decline.  Judaism 
was  then  where  Mohammedanism  and  Bud- 
dhism are  to-day.  Worship  was  formal,  serv- 
ice heartless,  faith  unthinking.  The  religious 
were  either  Pharisees — that  is,  sticklers  for 
form,  precedent,  and  creed — or  Sadducees,  who 
were  more  or  less  devout  unbelievers,  or  con- 
scientious but  narrow  Essenes — High  Church, 
Broad  Church,  and  Low  Church — formalists, 
rationalists,  or  pietists.  The  Pharisees  were 
champions  of  the  past,  forgetting  nothing  and 
learning  nothing;  they  held  that  the  Almighty 
wore  phylacteries,  and  their  motto  was  that 
"long  prayers  make  a  long  life."  The  Sad- 
ducees put  faith  in  no  one  but  themselves,  and 
were  contented  with  shrewd  devisings,  cheap 
tolerance,  and  glittering  generalities.  The 
Essenes  held  up  holy  hands  of  horror  toward 
all  the  others,  and  believed  that  if  the  truth 
were  told  it  would  appear  that  themselves 
monopolized  vital  godliness.  As  we  of  Amer- 


THE  ENVIRONMENT  43 

ica  might  describe  these  parties,  they  were  Old 
School,  New  Departure,  and  Salvation  Army. 
The  Sadducees  were  the  most  intellectual,  the 
Pharisees  the  most  proper,  and  the  Essenes 
most  in  sympathy  with  men. 

Over  against  the  formalities  of  a  decayed 
Hebraism  was  everywhere  apparent,  within 
the  diversely  populated  land  and  on  all  sides 
round  about,  a  confusion  of  no  less  decadent 
Paganistic  faiths.  Paganism,  then,  as  in  for- 
mer ages,  furnished  a  foil  to  Jewish  practise 
and  belief,  and  more  or  less  penetrated  into 
every  condition  of  social  life.  On  the  surface, 
Paganism  was  merry;  it  had  its  spring  festi- 
vals and  danced  about  a  May-pole;  it  had  its 
jolly  harvest  Saturnalia;  it  loved  sunshine, 
flowers,  wine,  and  song;  whatever  was  natural 
seemed  right,  and  religion,  far  from  "binding 
back"  —which  is  what  the  word  means — far 
from  checking  the  passions  and  mortifying 
selfishness  in  pleasure,  licensed  every  vice. 
The  temples  and  sacred  groves  resounded  with 
the  drunken  clamor  of  shameless  orgies.  Yet 
all  this  gaiety  was  only  on  the  surface;  for 


44     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Nature  was  not  only  sunshine,  flowers,  wine, 
and  laughter,  she  cherished  her  volcanoes,  her 
thunderbolts  and  hurricanes,  her  poisons,  dis- 
eases, and  famines,  her  pestilence,  and  her. 
death.  Beneath  the  gay  exterior  of  idol  wor- 
ship was  the  trembling  of  superstition,  forever 
haunted  by  specters.  The  dangerous,  venom- 
ous, hostile,  and  deadly  lurked  in  every 
shadow:  terror  begat  cruelty,  and  cruelty 
banished  any  real  sweetness  of  spirit.  Bloody 
sacrifices  alone  could  appease  the  jealous, 
vengeful  gods,  and  even  human  beings  must 
sometimes  die  on  divine  altars.  The  world, 
for  any  but  the  dull  and  brutal,  seemed  after 
all  a  sad  place,  and  therefore  suicide  was 
common;  and  even  philosophers  argued  that 
it  was  right  to  take  one's  life  when  cares  and 
pains  pressed  too  hard.  Those  who  had  made 
ship- wreck  of  life,  heart-sick,  plunged  into  the 
mystery  of  death  as  escape  into  the  unknown, 
which,  though  it  seemed  gruesome,  was  yet 
less  appalling  than  a  miserable  existence. 
Thus  Paganism,  with  all  its  merrymaking,  was 
helpless,  hopeless,  cynical,  and  sad. 


THE  ENVIRONMENT  45 

It  happened  that,  during  the  youth  of  Jesus, 
there  fell  across  this  confusion  of  posturing, 
doubting,  self-torment,  and  laughter,  of  self- 
ish indulgence,  of  cruelty  and  despair,  the 
long  shadow  of  a  sublime  personality.  Amid 
the  endless  chatter  of  texts  and  prayers,  of 
shouts  and  of  shrieks,  a  voice  of  thunder  was 
heard,  hushing  much  of  this  babble  into  mo- 
mentary silence. 

John  the  Baptist  appeared  upon  the  scene 
of  action. 

A  prophet  of  the  olden  time,  a  veritable 
Elijah,  who  had  no  earthly  interests  at  stake 
—no  wife,  child,  nor  home — a  hero  without 
fear,  dreading  the  most  ferocious  despot  no 
more  than  his  neighbor  the  desert  lion,  a  cave- 
man in  skins,  whose  food  was  less  palatable 
than  that  of  the  village  jackals.  He  was 
rather  a  Cry  than  a  human  being — a  Call  to 
every  conscience,  resounding  through  the  land : 
"Repent!  Repent!"  His  repentance  was 
nothing  subtle,  only  a  change  from  evil  to 
good,  and  his  cry  was  but  a  repetition  of  the 
old,  old  appeal,  "Cease  to  do  evil  and  learn 


46      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

to  do  well;  wash  you  of  your  sins,  make  you 
clean!"  And  he  invited  all  men  down  into 
Jordan,  and  his  words  were  emphasized  and 
made  memorable  in  his  simple  rite  of  washing, 
which  was  but  vivid  parable  in  righteousness, 
showing  pictorially  to  the  world  the  peril  and 
the  need  of  the  times. 

It  is  of  extreme  interest  to  the  theologian 
that  the  grand  history  of  Hebraism — of  its 
prophetic  fervor,  its  sacred  literature,  its 
splendid  Temple,  and  stately  liturgy — should 
have  ended  in  one  lone  man  calling  all  other 
men  to  repentance.  But  every  religion,  in  its 
last  analysis,  comes  down  to  this,  a  man 
speaking  in  tremendous  earnestness  to  his 
fellows  on  things  that  concern  the  relation  of 
the  immortal  soul  to  the  Unseen  World. 
Eloquent  exhortations,  holy  writings,  sacred 
shrines,  and  impressive  ritual  can,  after  all  is 
said,  mean  nothing  more  than  personal  piety 
and  personal  purity;  in  their  prosperity  and 
power  they  do  but  utter  this,  and  in  their 
decadence  it  is  this  that  calls  them  to  account 
and  pronounces  their  judgment.  It  is  perhaps 


THE  ENVIRONMENT  47 

well  for  the  world  to  be  reminded  now  and 
then,  by  the  very  isolation  of  stern  virtue,  that 
righteousness  is  realized  in  just  two  condi- 
tions, which  only  are  essential  to  the  whole 
idea — the  Voice  of  One  and  the  Response  of 
Many. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  SELF-DISCOVERY 

redeeming  feature  in  the  Judaism  of 
that  day  was  the  survival,  not  only  in 
John  but  in  many  men  and  women,  of  the 
old-time  expectation  of  a  Coming  Deliverer. 
If  everything  else  living  and  lofty  in  religion 
had  withered,  at  least  the  ancient  Messianic 
hope  was  still  green.  Perhaps  it  was  clung 
to  in  those  degenerate  days  with  a  greater 
tenacity  because  of  the  crassness  of  the  times, 
since  it  is  generally  in  periods  of  depression 
that  people  most  vividly  dream  of  the  past 
and  most  eagerly  await  the  future. 

The  Jewish  faith  in  a  coming  Messiah,  first 
and  last,  was  probably  as  noteworthy  and  as 
elevating  an  aspiration  as  ever  swayed  any 
race  of  men.  We  go  back  of  John  a  thou- 
sand years  and  find  a  whole  nation  listening 

48 


THE  SELF-DISCOVERY  49 

for  a  footfall,  and  never  tiring  of  their  vision 
and  never  despairing  on  account  of  delays. 

There  was  one  who  should  come  to  bring 
glory  and  peace!  The  people  were  always 
scanning  countenances  and  studying  the  times. 
No  king  could  assume  the  diadem  but  that 
popular  expectation  trembled  in  eager  hope 
that  he  might  prove  the  anointed  of  Jehovah; 
no  prophet  could  arise  but  he  must  meet  the 
query,  "Art  thou  He  that  should  come,  or 
look  we  for  another?"  There  was  always 
ahead,  no  matter  what  the  present  embarrass- 
ment, "a  fulness  of  times"  and  "an  end  of 
days"  when  these  things  should  be.  The 
more  the  expectation  was  disappointed  the 
stronger  it  became,  Messiah  through  delays 
only  became  lordlier  in  the  popular  imagina- 
tion, His  kingdom  more  extensive  and  power- 
ful, His  sway  more  magnificent.  Prophet, 
Priest,  and  King,  all  three,  He  should  be, 
uniting  in  Himself  every  hopeful  office  and  all 
fair  ideals;  His  enemies  would  bow  down  be- 
fore Him,  the  span  of  human  life  would 


50     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

lengthen,  the  very  desert  burst  into  blossom, 
and  Paradise  itself  return  with  flowers  and 
fruits  perennial. 

Every  Jewish  mother  hoped  to  give  birth 
to  this  Anointed.  Every  boy  was  free  to 
believe  that  he  might  prove  the  Deliverer. 
The  more  spiritual  the  nature,  the  more  in- 
tense the  hope,  the  ambition. 

By  how  much  Jesus  surpassed  other  lads 
in  gifts  of  mind  and  heart  by  so  much  was  He 
likely  to  excel  them,  in  mental  dwelling  upon 
this  possibility  and  in  emotional  yearning  to 
achieve  its  sublimities  of  character  and  action. 
That  this  was  true  of  Him  we  can  not  affirm 
as  history,  and  yet  the  imagination  compels 
us  to  it.  There  must  have  been  a  long  twi- 
light before  His  dawn  of  awakening.  We 
learn  from  the  annals  that  "He  increased  in 
wisdom  and  stature,"  the  mental  growth  being 
given  the  prominence  doubtless  because  more 
noticeable  and  pronounced.  Luke  assures  us 
that  He  was  "in  favor  with  God  and  man." 
He  was  "subject"  to  His  parents,  manifestly 
a  docile  child.  There  was  nothing  mon- 


THE  SELF-DISCOVERY  51 

strous,  uncanny,  or  even  prodigious  about  His 
early  youth.  In  the  Temple,  at  twelve,  was  He 
found  by  His  father  and  mother,  and  among 
the  devout  and  learned,  like  the  youthful 
Josephus  and  many  other  thoughtful  children 
of  the  times,  seeking  wisdom;  a  mere  lad 
among  bearded  rabbis,  He  was  not  prophesy- 
ing, He  was  making  no  claims,  and  not  even 
affecting  to  teach.  Knowing  that  He  was 
about  His  "Father's  business,"  He  was  simply 
listening  to  the  masters  of  Jewish  law  and 
lore,  and  only  asking  questions — evidently  a 
child  of  deep  thought,  a  dreamer,  pensive  on 
those  themes  which  occupied  the  devout  but 
were  beyond  the  ken  of  most  lads. 

The  unusual  childhood  must  have  been 
followed  by  a  very  unwonted  youth.  To  be 
sure  the  record  fails  us  here,  and  for  nearly  a 
score  of  years  we  are  left  to  our  surmisings, 
but  in  view  of  what  preceded  and  followed 
these  may  have  all  the  force  of  recorded  facts. 
All  other  geniuses,  before  their  awakening  to 
vision  of  their  high  destiny,  have  lived  an  un- 
recorded inner  experience  of  long  preparation. 


52     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

There  was  always  a  proem  before  the  drama. 
The  psychological  development  preceded  the 
historical  appearance.  Between  the  boyhood 
of  which  we  have  such  meager  account,  and 
maturity,  there  must  have  been  a  chrysalis 
stage  of  growth  for  the  coming  glory  of  wings 
and  flight. 

It  is  quite  incredible  that  at  an  age  so 
mature  as  thirty,  Jesus  could  have  failed  to 
observe  his  possession  of  peculiar  gifts,  gifts 
denied  his  comrades.  Mind-reading  and 
lucidity  do  not  come  unawares,  nor  remain 
hidden;  his  healing  gift  must  have  already 
wrought  results  attracting  attention.  Mary's 
confidence  in  His  ability  to  turn  water  into 
wine  at  Cana,  in  the  very  beginning  of  His 
public  ministry,  argues  some  family  discovery 
and  recognition  of  His  powers. 

And  this  was  the  least  of  the  psychological 
unfolding.  All  those  years  were  brooding- 
time  over  the  condition  of  Israel,  the  hope  of 
the  world,  the  coming  Messiah,  and  the  sub- 
lime possibility  hovering  above  every  young 
Jew. 


THE  SELF-DISCOVERY  53 

But  we  must  not  deem  Him  to  have  dis- 
covered Himself  before  the  event  of  His  bap- 
tism by  John. 

Nor  had  others  discovered  Him.  Though 
He  excited  astonishment  on  account  of  His 
deep  thoughtf illness  and  spirituality,  He  surely 
did  not  awaken  any  extravagant  expectations 
on  the  part  of  friends  and  neighbors.  There 
is  absolutely  no  scriptural  warrant  for  the 
conclusion  that  His  precocity  encouraged  any 
one,  whether  at  the  time  of  His  being  found 
in  the  Temple  with  the  rabbis  or  later,  up  to 
the  meeting  with  John,  to  expect  from  Him 
redemption  for  Israel.  He  was  only  a  poor 
peasant,  with  some  technical  skill  as  a  car- 
penter but  without  even  the  rudiments  of 
scholarly  education.  People  of  course  knew 
that  prophets  had  arisen  from  the  lowliest  of 
the  population,  like  Micah,  and  that  nothing 
forbade  His  becoming  a  seer  should  Jehovah 
call  Him  and  grant  the  needed  gift;  but  to 
be  a  son  of  David,  to  receive  the  chrism  of 
kings,  to  lead  the  armies  of  Israel,  that  was 
hardly  for  one  peasant-born.  Even  His  cousin, 


54      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

John  the  Baptist,  though  recognizing  in  Him 
unusual  personal  worth,  failed  to  build  great 
expectations  for  Israel  on  His  future.  "I 
knew  Him  not,"  protested  the  Baptist,  "but 
He  that  sent  me  to  baptize  with  water,  the 
Same  said  unto  me,  'Upon  whom  thou  shalt 
see  the  Spirit  descending  and  remaining  on 
him,'  the  same  is  he  that  baptizeth  with  the 
Holy  Ghost." 

But  though  Jesus  did  not  at  first  strongly 
draw  John,  the  latter  powerfully  attracted 
Jesus.  The  very  deep  impression  His  cousin 
had  made  upon  the  young  Prophet  appeared 
later,  when  the  Master  declared  to  His  disciples 
that  of  all  born  of  woman  a  greater  than  John 
the  Baptist  had  not  risen. 

John  not  only  brought  Jesus  to  an  open 
profession  of  faith,  as  we  should  say,  he  helped 
the  dreamer  to  self-discovery.  The  young 
convert,  though  needing  no  religious  awaken- 
ing, as  John  perceived  at  once — His  attitude 
appearing  to  the  Baptist  as  one  of  intense 
barkening  for  the  Father's  voice  and  child-like 
faith  in  the  Father's  love — came  to  Jordan, 


or  THE 
UNIVERSITY 

OF 


THE  SELF-DISCOVERY  55 

not  driven,  as  were  others,  by  fear  or  remorse, 
but  in  eagerness  to  "fulfil  all  righteousness." 

And  in  the  waters  of  baptism  He  found 
Himself. 

Here  occurred  the  critical  turning-point,  not 
of  conversion,  nor  of  decision,  but  of  illumina- 
tion. It  was  like  Saul's  eye-opening  after  the 
vision  on  the  way  to  Damascus.  The  Dove 
was  to  Jesus  what  the  Burning  Bush  was  to 
Moses,  the  Live  Coal  to  Isaiah,  or  the  Bo  Tree 
to  Gautama.  If  any  one  think  to  find  in  so 
simple  an  incident  as  the  descent  of  the  Dove 
an  insufficient  occasion  for  the  mental  tumult 
that  followed,  history  will  furnish  many  an- 
other no  less  trivial  awakening  of  genius  that 
was  anything  but  trivial  in  results — a  Giotto 
at  ten  years  of  age  self-discovered  in  his  char- 
coal drawings  of  sheep  upon  a  stone;  a  Cor- 
reggio  made  known  to  himself  in  a  study  of 
one  of  Raphael's  pictures;  a  Canova  in  his 
lion  shaped  out  of  butter.  It  is  told  of  Samuel 
Johnson  that,  when  a  youth,  hunting  for  some 
apples  laid  away  in  an  old  library  he  came 
upon  a  copy  of  Petrarch,  which  opened  to  his 


56     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

eager  mind  a  whole  new  world  of  literature. 
Bossuet  casually  turned  the  leaves  of  his  Bible 
to  Isaiah  and  foresaw  his  future.  So  the  Dove 
was  fatal  to  Jesus  and  the  turning-point  of  a 
great  destiny.  If  we  choose  to  look  at  His  life 
as  a  drama  the  Baptism  was  the  first  scene  in 
the  first  act  of  a  sublime  tragedy  and  all  before 
was  the  proem. 

Whether  a  miracle  was  wrought  at  this  time 
it  is  unnecessary  to  inquire.  To  Jesus,  as  to 
John,  what  happened  had  the  force  of  the 
supernatural.  To  John  as  to  Jesus,  and  to 
all  present,  His  baptism  was  His  Call.  Vision 
cleared,  doubt  vanished,  the  dream  came  true, 
the  psychological  seed-sowing  bore  fruit,  am- 
bition received  its  crown. 

He  now  was  discovered,  He  now  discovered 
Himself,  as  the  Beloved  of  God,  the  Sent,  the 
Divine  Healer,  the  Anointed. 

Here  two  seas  met,  the  Deep  of  Humanity 
and  the  Ocean  of  the  Infinite.  The  descending 
of  the  dove  and  the  sound  in  the  skies  cleared 
away  all  doubts  and  dissolved  all  clouds. 

In  the  intense  mental  excitement  and  spir- 


THE  SELF-DISCOVERY  57 

itual  elevation  of  the  moment,  He  knew  Him- 
self as  filled  with  the  Spirit.  The  Hebrew 
word  for  prophet,  "nabi,"  the  root  idea  of 
which  is  that  of  bubbling,  effervescence,  ex- 
actly expressed  the  state  of  mind  and  heart. 
He  was  now,  in  Hebrew  parlance,  a  "man  of 
the  Spirit,"  in  whom  the  divine  afflatus  was 
striving  for  complete  mastery. 

Jesus  had  become  a  nabi. 

There  remained,  however,  a  question  of 
submission.  He  was  where  Moses  stood  when 
God  said  to  him,  "  Go,  and  I  will  be  with  thy 
mouth  and  will  teach  thee,  what  thou  shouldst 
say," — where  Isaiah  was,  when  the  live  coal 
touched  his  lips  and  the  fainting  heart  heard 
the  words  of  the  divine  commission  with  terror; 
where  Jeremiah  found  himself  when,  pleading 
that  he  was  but  a  babe,  he  besought  Jehovah 
to  send  whom  He  would  send  and  to  spare 
him,  and  when  yet  he  continued  to  hear  the 
dread  imperative  call  to  leave  all,  and  to  dare 
all,  and  to  lose  all,  for  the  sake  of  righteousness. 

It  may  seem  an  enormous  presumption  to 
us  that  any  mere  Jew,  however  gifted  and 


58     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

self-consecrated,  and  much  more  one  of  the 
peasant  class,  should  aspire  to  the  fulfilment 
of  the  race  ideal  and  satisfaction  of  the  supreme 
national  yearning;  and  it  would  have  been 
such  but  for  the  young  nabi's  conception  of 
the  work  before  Him.  Had  the  Messianic 
program  before  Him  involved  political  power, 
gold,  fame,  and  glory,  His  would  have  been 
only  another  case  of  rather  vulgar  and  very 
worldly  ambition;  it  would  have  been  like  the 
hope  and  expectation  of  one  of  becoming 
President  of  the  United  States,  which  many  a 
rail-splitter,  many  a  bargeman,  many  a  farm 
boy  in  this  country  has  cherished.  But  to 
this  Prophet  the  pathway  of  the  Messiah,  like 
that  of  Moses,  Isaiah,  or  Jeremiah,  alluded  to, 
was  an  ascent  of  rocks,  His  coming  kingly 
crown  a  wreath  of  thorns,  His  power  a  stress 
upon  disease,  death,  and  sin,  His  fame  the 
luster  of  self-denying  virtue,  His  radiance  only 
a  shining,  through  Himself  effaced,  of  the 
Divine  Light.  It  was  not  a  case  of  ambition 
in  the  ordinary  sense,  but  of  self-discovery, 
as  of  one  called  to  danger,  to  wide-eyed  amaze- 


THE  SELF-DISCOVERY  59 

ment,  almost  to  shivering  terror.  Such  a  con- 
viction was  possible  only  to  conscious  genius 
when  swayed  by  sublime  self-devotion. 

There  is  a  time  in  the  lives  of  all  men  of 
genius  when  they  attain  their  sublimest  height 
of  thought.  Alexander  was  greatest  when  in 
the  desert  he  poured  out  upon  the  baking 
sands  the  helmet  full  of  sparkling  water 
brought  to  quench  his  bitter  thirst,  thinking 
it  unworthy  of  him  to  refresh  himself  when 
his  brave  soldiers  were  nigh  perishing  for  need 
of  drink.  Caesar  was  greatest  when  in  Egypt 
he  remarked  that  he  would  give  all  his  victories 
in  exchange  for  one  glimpse  of  the  real  sources 
of  the  river  Nile.  Luther  never  rose  so  high 
as  in  his  declaration  before  the  imperial  diet, 
death  seemingly  in  full  prospect:  "I  can  do 
no  otherwise,  so  help  me  God!"  The  genius 
of  Jesus  seems  to  us  at  its  highest  point  of 
flight  and  His  personality  in  its  sublimest  un- 
folding when  He,  for  the  first  time  after  self- 
discovery,  confessed  to  His  own  heart,  "  I  am, 
I  am  the  King— I  am— God  pity  me!  the  King 
Messiah!" 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  CRISIS  DECISION 

rpHERE  followed  for  Jesus  a  long  seclu- 
sion, during  which  He  struggled  with 
Himself.  The  Spirit  of  God  seethed  and 
effervesced  in  Him  as  of  old  in  Moses,  Isaiah, 
and  Jeremiah.  He  fled  from  the  companion- 
ship of  men  into  absolute  solitude  and  con- 
tinuous soliloquy,  not,  like  Elijah,  hurrying  to 
Sinai  to  escape  danger  and  duty,  but,  like  the 
great  lawgiver,  undisturbed  to  think  out  His 
thoughts,  to  talk  with  God,  to  grasp  the 
grandeur  of  His  mission.  One  evangelist 
declares  that  the  Spirit  "cast  Him  out,"  as  if 
to  picture  the  tempest  of  emotions  that  swept 
Him  from  the  abodes  of  men. 

Alone,  in  a  wilderness,  Jesus  mused  upon 
His  destiny.  Surely  He  was,  like  Moses, 
Isaiah,  and  Jeremiah,  the  Sent  of  Jehovah; 
but,  unlike  those  worthies,  He  was  also  the 

60 


THE  CRISIS  OF  DECISION  61 

King  that  was  to  come,  and  uneasy  lies  the 
head  that  wears  a  crown.  In  the  wonderment 
of  this  discovery,  in  the  strangeness  of  self- 
revealment  as  a  Divine  Messenger,  during  the 
dire  effort  to  master  His  own  consciousness  of 
new  duty  from  the  appalling  outlook  upon  a 
life  of  mastery  over  men,  of  heroism  and  of 
martyrdom,  with  the  new  sense  of  widening 
horizon  and  of  vast  scope  of  power  and  au- 
thority, came  that  inevitable  accompaniment 
of  decision,  temptation. 

It  has  been  customary  to  make  light  of  this 
ordeal  in  the  interests  of  dogmatic  theology 
and  ecclesiastical  tradition;  and  in  most 
systems  of  Christian  thought,  this  entire  ex- 
perience of  the  Master  has  been  treated  as 
something  phenomenal,  spectacular,  and  un- 
real, a  mere  triumphal  display  of  immaculate 
virtue  under  even  the  subtlest  assaults.  No 
unworthy  motive  has  been  allowed  the  least 
weight  with  Jesus,  no  bad  argument  for  Him 
supposed  to  possess  any  cogency  whatever, 
and  no  vulnerable  point  of  attack  acknowl- 
edged. The  very  possibility  of  fall  has  been 


62     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

admitted  only  as  a  shadowy  metaphysical  con- 
ception. 

This,  however,  does  not  satisfy  the  condi- 
tions of  the  situation,  nor  deal  honestly  with 
the  recording  annals.  Evil  motives  were  cer- 
tainly appealed  to,  bad  arguments  commonly 
effective  with  men  were  used,  and  points  of 
attack  were  carefully  selected  which,  if  not 
weak  in  Jesus,  in  most,  even  of  the  best,  of 
men  are  wont  to  be  salient. 

The  description  of  the  temptation  is  highly 
pictorial,  and  must  be  deemed  one  of  the 
Master's  parables,  no  doubt  often  repeated  to 
His  disciples  in  narrative  form  as  a  most  im- 
portant lesson.  But,  although  thus  in  illus- 
trative dress,  it  bears  all  the  marks  of  actual 
occurrence  and  indicates  a  struggle  of  terrible 
severity. 

Nor  was  there  anything  supernatural  or  un- 
usual about  the  occurrence  in  any  of  its 
details.  No  genius,  newly  self-discovered,  has 
ever  escaped  such  crises  of  trial,  and  the  temp- 
tations resisted  or  yielded  to  have  been  those 
attributed  to  Jesus. 


THE  CRISIS  OF  DECISION  63 

In  what  is  described  by  the  evangelists  as 
the  first  temptation,  the  motive  played  upon 
was  the  innate  faithlessness  of  human  nature, 
the  argument  was  the  very  cogent  stress  of 
hunger,  and  the  point  of  attack  that  possession 
of  psychic  gifts  which,  with  most  men,  would 
have  been  the  surest  guarantee  of  fall.  The 
tempter's  suggestions  appealing  to  that  elation 
which  naturally  accompanies  a  sense  of  new 
and  unexpected  ability,  opportunity,  or  au- 
thority, were  well  fitted  to  work  a  godless  self- 
confidence.  The  nabi  was  perishing  with 
hunger  from  one  of  those  long  fastings  which, 
in  the  East,  are  considered  the  unavoidable 
conditions  of  spiritual  elevation,  and  which 
we  hungry  westerners  and  gross  feeders  can 
so  little  comprehend:  "Why  not,  relying  on 
mighty  self  rather  than  on  a  so  forgetful 
Providence,  use  this  wonderful  psychic  gift, 
which  knows  without  learning,  sees  without 
eyes,  remembers  without  memory,  and  foresees 
what  has  not  yet  occurred,  to  satisfy  just 
appetite?" 

In  the  second  temptation  the  motive  reverses 


64      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

itself  and  becomes  that  very  faith  which 
baffled  the  first  assault,  and  the  other  side  of 
the  citadel  is  attacked.  If  faith  were  so 
supremely  desirable,  surely  one  could  not 
have  too  much  of  it.  "  Go,  O  mighty  prophet, 
tried  and  true,  go  to  the  Holy  City  and  leap 
from  the  pinnacle  of  the  Temple,  in  full  sight 
of  wondering  multitudes!  trust  God's  angels, 
and  thus  at  once  prove  thy  Messianic  claims 
and  accomplish  speedily  thy  mission!"  This, 
however,  would  have  been  a  mere  display  of 
fanaticism  or  overfaith,  the  antipode  of  self- 
confidence,  but  equally  reprehensible,  indeed 
the  second  focus  in  the  same  ellipse  of  human 
folly. 

The  last  onslaught  uncovered  masked  bat- 
teries, and  attempted  to  carry  the  young  nabi's 
virtue  by  storm.  The  motive  became  ambi- 
tion, the  argument  an  urging  of  the  practical 
omnipotence  in  human  affairs  of  powerful 
selfishness,  the  salient  point  pride.  "Use 
your  rare  gifts  for  supremacy,  subdue  all 
kingdoms,  enjoy  universal  dominion,  and 
satisfy  your  conscience  by  ruling  in  beneficence 


THE  CRISIS  OP  DECISION  65 

though  not  regardless  of  self!  Be  an  Alex- 
ander, a  Caesar,  an  Augustus!"  Most  terrible 
of  all  temptations  because  the  most  deceptive 
and  alluring;  the  more  deceptive  because 
ambition  is  often  noble,  the  more  alluring 
because  the  most  sublime. 

The  three  sins  repelled  in  the  wilderness, 
then,  were  self-confidence,  which  is  the  disease 
of  elation;  fanaticism,  which  is  faith  height- 
ened to  folly;  and  ambition,  which  is  the  lure 
of  conscious  greatness.  Every  man  of  genius, 
become  aware  of  lofty  mission,  and  indeed 
every  child  of  fortune,  though  the  sudden  gift 
be  but  gold,  has  reflected  this  experience  of 
the  Master,  in  its  allurements  if  not  in  its 
triumphs.  Self-confidence,  or,  if  not  that, 
overfaith,  or  else  carnal  ambition — it  may  be 
all  three — struggling  for  a  favored  soul — this 
drama,  not  seldom  tragedy — aye,  tragedy  for 
the  tempted  and  often  for  many  others — re- 
peats itself  on  every  page  of  history  and  is 
enacted  about  us  daily.  In  all  that  long  and 
fateful  soliloquy  the  Prophet  was  tempted  in 
all  points  like  ourselves,  and  thus  the  struggle 


66      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

in  the  wilderness  was  well  fitted  to  become 
one  of  the  sublimest  and  most  instructive  of 
His  parables.  It  was  doubtless  on  this  ac- 
count that  Jesus  adopted  the  pictorial  method 
in  afterward  describing  to  His  disciples  this 
crucial  testing  of  His  worth.  There  was  no 
Satan,  there  were  no  angels,  there  were  not 
three  successive  trials;  there  was  long  struggle 
with  faithlessness,  fanaticism,  and  ambition, 
a  real  conflict  and  a  genuine  victory. 

The  triumph  of  the  tempted  fitted  Him  for 
His  mission  and  sent  Him  forth  "that  Prophet 
which  was  to  come"  and  "the  Savior  of  the 
world." 

That  Jesus  did  not  thereupon  cease  to 
undergo  the  stress  of  temptation,  and  along 
these  very  same  lines,  is  not  to  be  questioned 
by  any  but  the  credulous.  It  is  no  more  true 
that  He  ceased  to  fight  evil  suggestion,  settling 
with  the  tempter  once  for  all,  than  it  is  that 
His  struggle  was  at  one  time  with  a  visible 
Satan,  in  definite  successive  order  of  alluring 
suggestions.  Temptation  must  have  returned 
to  Him,  as  with  others,  from  time  to  time. 


THE  CRISIS  OF  DECISION  67 

But  this  was  the  crisis  of  decision,  this  the 
maelstrom  of  self-discovery — the  brave  vault- 
ing into  the  saddle  on  hearing  the  trumpet. 
The  temptations  of  a  great  career  were  here 
anticipated,  epitomized,  and  thrown  into  vivid 
foreshadowing.  It  was  the  splendid  triumph 
of  initial  self-surrender  and  whole-souled  con- 
secration. 

Indeed,  we  know  that  a  moment  came  later 
when  all  this  mental  conflict  took  outward 
form  and  all  these  temptations  actualized 
themselves  in  a  great  event.  Precisely  what 
happened  in  the  soliloquy  of  the  wilderness 
occurred  on  the  Mount  of  Olives,  when  the 
people  called  Him  to  the  throne  of  David. 
The  narrative  referred  to  is  so  thrilling  and 
significant  in  this  connection,  that  we  may  be 
pardoned  for  dwelling  upon  it  for  a  moment. 
It  proves  what  the  Parable  of  the  Temptation 
pictured,  that  He,  who  was  to  master  the 
world,  first  had  mastered  Himself. 

Jesus  was  approaching  the  Holy  City  for 
the  last  time.  Expectation  was  rife  and 
anxiety  strained  among  the  common  people, 


68     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

and  all  thoughtful  Jews  were  perceiving  that 
Jesus  must  now  show  Himself  the  Christ  with 
a  high  hand  or  go  down  forever  before  powerful 
and  pitiless  foes.  His  approach  to  the  capital, 
on  this  occasion,  was  a  challenge  to  the  Phar- 
isees, a  defiance  of  the  Sanhedrim,  a  provoca- 
tion for  the  Roman  authorities.  He  must  now 
seat  Himself  triumphantly  on  the  throne  of 
David  or  perish  miserably.  He  had  left  His 
hiding-place  beyond  Jordan,  though  an  out- 
cast, excommunicated  and  proscribed,  and  He 
was  entering  the  city  boldly  and  openly. 
With  Him  was  Bartimseus,  the  blind  beggar 
of  Jericho  restored  to  sight,  with  Him  Laz- 
arus of  Bethany,  just  called  forth  alive  from 
a  sepulcher.  His  audacity  seemed  measure- 
less, His  arm  was  bared,  His  very  words  were 
sharper  than  two-edged  sword.  What  could 
avail  now  hirelings  of  high  priests  or  of  pro- 
curator ?  He  must  at  once  proclaim  Himself, 
throw  Himself  upon  Heaven's  aid,  call  forth 
the  twelve  legions  of  angels,  summon  from  the 
skies  chariots  of  fire,  and  rule  and  restore! 
The  people,  so  arguing,  very  naturally 


THE  CRISIS  OF  DECISION  69 

thronged  out  to  meet  Him;  and  when  they 
encountered  the  long  procession  of  pilgrims 
and  disciples  and  amid  these  the  Prophet, 
riding  after  the  foretold  manner  and  ancient 
custom  of  kings,  their  enthusiasm  could  not 
contain  itself.  Pilgrims  and  disciples  caught 
the  contagion.  The  multitude  cast  their  gala 
garments  in  His  way,  and  plucking  off  palm- 
branches  and  waving  them  in  token  of  ex- 
pected victory,  threw  them  at  His  feet.  The 
throng  became  a  triumphal  procession,  and 
before  and  after  rose  the  significant  shout, 
"Hosanna  to  the  Son  of  David!  hosanna,  in 
the  highest!  Blessed  be  the  KING  that  cometh 
in  the  Name  of  the  Lord!  Peace  in  Heaven 
and  glory  in  the  highest!" 

This  meant,  to  all  who  heard,  "Now  let  the 
proud  Pharisees,  the  priests,  and  the  scribes 
bend  or  break!  Away  with  Pilate  and  his 
legionaries!  Come,  death,  grapple  with  Ro- 
man eagle,  and  come,  Victory  and  National 
Glory!  Victory,  victory,  terror  and  dominion 
from  the  River  unto  the  Ends  of  the  earth!" 

It  was  the  wilderness  again,  and  hunger  and 


70     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

proud  elation  and  sublime  ambition  assaulting 
holy  genius. 

And  Jesus? 

He  expected  the  ovation,  He  permitted  it- 
aye,  He  justified  it!  When  some  angry  Phar- 
isees bade  Him  rebuke  His  disciples  and  re- 
press the  people,  He  did  but  reply,  "I  tell  you, 
that  if  these  should  hold  their  peace,  the  stones 
would  immediately  cry  out!" 

But  notice  that,  while  the  crowds  were 
shouting  with  His  approval,  the  Master  had 
burst  into  tears.  He  had  caught  sight  of  the 
Holy  City  and,  in  sudden  dread  prophetic 
vision,  He  was  seeing  its  overthrow.  Yes,  He 
was  King  indeed,  but  not  to  mount  throne  of 
ivory  or  to  wield  scepter  of  gold;  His  crown 
should  be  woven  of  thorns,  His  scepter  a  reed, 
and  His  throne  a  cross.  He  was  easily  first 
of  all  men,  but  only  by  having  made  Himself 
slave  of  all.  His  kingdom  was  not  of  this 
world. 

He  forgot  the  shouting  multitudes,  He 
ignored  the  festive  way  of  gala  robes  and  palm- 
branches  and,  stretching  out  yearning  arms 


THE  CRISIS  OF  DECISION  71 

toward  Jerusalem,  He  murmured,  in  His 
tears,  "If  thou  hadst  known  the  things  that 
belong  to  thy  peace,  but  now  they  are  hidden 
from  thine  eyes!" 

As  in  the  wilderness,  Satan  left  Him  and 
angels  again  ministered  to  His  wants.  Ever 
tempted,  now  and  again,  He  endured  to  the 
end,  battling  with  faithlessness  and  fanaticism, 
content  with  His  scepter  of  righteousness,  the 
throne  of  His  sacrifices  and  His  kingdom  of 
love. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS 

HPHUS,  stated  in  a  general  way,  Jesus, 
having  discovered  Himself,  accepted 
Himself  at  His  own  valuation  and  went  forth 
to  His  work,  feeling  on  Him  the  oil  of  divine 
consecration,  to  battle  lifelong  temptation  and 
to  continue  until  the  end  of  His  mission  true 
to  Himself. 

But  it  remains  for  us  to  ask,  before  we  shall 
have  brought  to  its  logical  ending  this  Second 
Part  of  our  little  treatise,  what  in  particular, 
what  in  details,  was  that  Himself  which  He 
discovered  and  to  which  He  must  prove  true. 

For  this  we  must  study  the  records.  There 
is  no  evidence  in  these  that  there  was  any 
wavering  in  His  conception  of  His  personal- 
ity and  authority  during  His  brief  ministry. 
There  was  some  growth  in  apostolic  estimate 

of  Him,   as  we  shall  soon  see,   but  critical 

72 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  73 

treatment  of  the  four  Gospels  will  give  us  no 
growth  in  the  Master's  own  apprehension  of 
His  dignity  of  office  and  Messianic  gifts. 

What,  now,  were  the  claims  of  Jesus  as  to 
Himself  ?  What  in  detail  did  He  believe  Him- 
self to  be  ?  He  asserted  Messianic  authority, 
to  what  was  this  equivalent?  This  chapter 
will  busy  itself  with  these  questions. 

Jesus  of  Nazareth  has  been  an  enigma  for 
all  the  ages.  His  own  relatives  at  one  time 
deemed  Him  insane  (Mark  3 :  21).  The  multi- 
tude sometimes  described  in  Him  a  successor 
for  David  and  sometimes  inferred  that  He 
was  no  better  than  a  Samaritan  and  had  a 
devil.  The  Pharisees  feared  Him  as  a  re- 
former of  abuses  by  which  they  profited  and 
as  an  agitator,  who,  influencing  the  passions 
and  arousing  the  enthusiasm  of  the  common 
people,  might  embroil  the  nation  in  a  hopeless 
war  with  Rome.  The  Romans,  on  the  other 
hand,  not  taking  Him  seriously,  considered 
Him  a  harmless  crank.  The  guilty  King 
Herod  trembled  lest  he  might  be  John  the 
Baptist  come  to  life  again  and  dangerous. 


74      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

The  disciples,  after  His  death,  accepting  at 
last  His  Messianic  assumption,  soon  placed 
Him  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Throne  of  God, 
as  the  Name,  the  Logos.  To  Peter  He  was 
the  Christ,  the  Son  of  the  Living  God,  even 
before  His  death;  to  Martha  He  was,  yet 
living,  the  "Christ,  the  Son  of  God,  which 
should  come  into  the  world."  After- ages 
deified  Him. 

Our  concern  now  is  with  none  of  these 
estimates  of  contemporaries  and  successors, 
but  with  His  own  judgment  upon  His  person- 
ality and  authority.  What  did  the  Master 
teach  about  Himself?  Directly  we  can  learn 
this  only  from  careful  study  of  the  four  gos- 
pels, but  indirectly  we  learn  something  from 
the  Book  of  Acts  and  the  Epistles. 

In  the  four  gospels  we  find  two  very  dis- 
tinct characterizations  of  Jesus.  In  Matthew, 
Mark,  and  Luke,  we  have  the  historical 
Prophet  as  He  appeared  to  simple-minded 
men,  His  deeds  and  words  reported  without 
comment  and  in  exactness.  Indeed,  these 
gospels  are  mere  annals,  drawing  their  material 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  75 

from  older  crystallized  tradition  (Luke  1:1), 
oral  or  written,  and  hence,  as  having  sources 
in  common,  identical  in  spirit,  method,  and 
much  of  substance.  In  these,  Jesus  appears 
with  scarcely  any  variation  of  point  of  view, 
saying  and  doing  practically  the  same  things. 
The  three  streams  of  tradition  run  nearly 
parallel,  and  the  Christ  of  these  "synoptists" 
is  one  singularly  luminous  personality,  a  living 
and  real  being,  intensely  Himself. 

The  fourth  Gospel  (John's)  furnishes  quite 
another  point  of  view,  and  far  from  being  a 
mere  collection  of  sayings  and  anecdotes,  it  is 
a  philosophical  treatise,  presenting  the  fact 
and  problem  of  Jesus  with  running  comment 
in  fulfilment  of  a  definite  purpose  clearly 
stated  (John  20:  21).  It  is,  in  short,  a  sacred 
commentary,  the  author  playing  the  part  of  a 
Greek  chorus  to  disentangle  the  plot  and  ex- 
plain the  motive.  So  frequent  is  the  occur- 
rence of  explanation  and  elucidation  that  the 
reader  is  often  embarrassed  to  distinguish  be- 
tween the  comments  of  the  writer  and  the 
actual  utterances  ascribed  to  the  Master. 


76     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Such  comments  will  be  found  in  John  1 :  1-5, 
7-14,  16-18;  2:  21,  22;  3:  13-21  (?),  34-36; 
6:  6,  65-71;  7:  39;  8:  20  (last  clause) ;  11:  13, 
42(?),  51,  52;  12:  38-41;  13:  3,  27  (first 
clause);  18:  9;  19:  24  (explanatory  clause),  36, 
37;  20:  30,  31. 

A  good  illustration  of  this  difficulty  in  dis- 
entanglement of  discourse  from  comment  will 
be  found  in  the  conversation  with  Nicodemus, 
and  one  may  fairly  ask  with  some  uncertainty 
whether  John  3:  21  is  to  be  credited  to  the 
author  or  to  the  Prophet.  In  at  least  one 
saying  (11:  42),  perhaps  by  error  of  tran- 
scribers, comment  surely  epexegetical  has 
worked  into  the  Master's  very  speech,  and 
appears  in  the  first  person. 

Moreover,  the  fourth  Gospel  cannot  escape 
a  suspicion  of  philosophic  bias.  Whatever  the 
opening  verses  of  the  book  may  mean,  whether 
that  Jesus  was  an  emanation  of  the  Deity,  or 
the  Deity  in  person,  or  only  filled  and  inspired 
by  the  Divine  Logos  (or  Reason),  it  ought  not 
to  be  questioned  that  the  influence  of  Philo 
and  of  Platonism  is  discernible.  The  best 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  77 

critical  judgment  of  to-day  places  the  compo- 
sition of  the  Gospel  of  John  at  an  early  date, 
surely  not  later  than  the  second  century,  and 
not  too  far  away  from  trustworthy  narration, 
and  we  are  disposed  to  view  the  material  as 
substantially  historical.  Here  evidently,  how- 
ever, we  are  dealing  with  history  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  commentator,  who  had 
begun  to  muse  upon  the  facts.  The  life  of  the 
Prophet  has  come  to  submit  itself  to  philo- 
sophic interpretation  and  theological  specula- 
tion. The  fourth  Gospel  is  not  mentioned  in 
the  writings  of  Papias,  Polycarp,  Barnabas, 
Clement  of  Rome,  or  Ignacius.  John  the 
Apostle  could  not  have  been  its  author,  at  least 
in  the  present  form;  as,  however  much  of  the 
terminology  and  local  coloring  remind  us  of 
the  "Beloved"  Apostle's  First  Epistle,  it  is 
far  from  improbable  that  the  substance  of  the 
narrative  and  discourse  came  really  from  his 
hand,  to  undergo,  at  a  later  date,  a  recension 
in  the  interest  of  philosophical  speculation  and 
of  practical  commentary.  Beyond  reasonable 
question  the  closing  chapter  must  be  deemed 


78      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

a  subsequent  addition  and  by  still  another 
author. 

The  Jesus  of  the  fourth  Gospel  is  pictured 
as  a  sublime  genius,  lifted  far  above  all  around 
Him,  living  a  hidden  life,  walking  alone  with 
God,  a  teacher  who  only  so  far  as  possible 
admits  His  disciples  to  fellowship  in  His  aspira- 
tions, faiths,  and  purposes,  but  who  appeals  to 
spirituality  generally  in  vain — a  being  in- 
breathed of  the  Spirit  of  God,  who  only  now 
and  then  revealed  to  the  devout,  and  in 
moments  of  their  loftiest  flight  of  thought, 
the  esoteric  aspects  of  His  teaching  and 
work. 

Nor  is  there  anything  unlikely  or  even  sus- 
picious in  this  portrayal;  indeed,  improbabil- 
ity would  rather  rest  on  any  theory  of  fictitious 
invention,  for  who  but  a  very  Christ,  in  that 
age,  could  have  conceived  and  outlined  this 
sublime  personality?  It  is  not  unlikely  that 
there  were  sides  of  character  in  so  colossal  a 
genius  which  such  simple-minded  collectors  of 
annals  did  but  faintly  or  not  at  all  discern, 
and  which  might,  to  a  more  spiritual  nature, 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  79 

furnish  a  divine  ideal  and  lend  itself  to  philo- 
sophical treatment. 

According  to  the  synoptists  (Matthew,  Mark, 
and  Luke),  Jesus  claimed  that  He  was  Master, 
that  is,  Teacher;  and  in  the  memorabilia  com- 
piled by  these  authors,  this  Master  always 
emphasized  the  scholastic  I  and  spake  with 
authority,  not  like  the  scribes,  in  mere  ex- 
planation of  those  of  olden  times,  but  in 
emendation  of  the  most  sacred  of  the  seers  of 
the  past.  He  was  a  physician  and  came  to 
heal  the  "sick."  He  was  "that  Prophet 
which  was  to  appear,"  greater  than  Elijah  and 
John  the  Baptist,  Herald  of  the  Kingdom  of 
God.  He  was  the  "Son  of  Man,"  or  typical 
humanity;  He  was  the  "Son  of  God,"  or 
typical  piety.  He  was  the  very  Christ,  the 
foretold  Messiah  (the  Anointed),  and  hence  a 
King,  "of  a  kingdom  appointed  of  the 
Father."  He  was  antitype  of  that  "servant" 
mentioned  in  Isaiah  52.  He  was  Lord  over 
the  Sabbath  and  greater  than  the  Temple. 

Still,  He  did  nothing  of  Himself,  and  in  all 
things  was  the  Ambassador  of  God,  and  He 


80     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

cast  out  devils  and  did  many  mighty  works 
"by  the  Spirit  of  God"  and  "by  the  Finger 
of  God."  Claiming  no  perfection,  He  rebuked 
a  young  man  for  calling  Him  "good,"  insist- 
ing that  "there  is  none  good  but  One." 
Though  a  Seer  of  great  scope  of  vision,  yet  He 
knew  not  "that  day."  He  had  authority  to 
declare  forgiveness,  but  was  no  judge  for 
settling  legal  disputes  (Mark  2 :  5,  where  one 
must  notice  that  the  perfect  is  used,  "thy  sins 
have  been  forgiven  thee."  See  also  Luke 
5:  23,  24).  Nor  was  it  His  province  "to  give, 
who  should  sit  on  His  right  hand  and  on  His 
left  hand,  in  His  kingdom"  (Matth.  11:  40). 
He  predicted  that  He  would  be  scourged  and 
crucified,  would  die  and  be  three  days  buried, 
and  arise  on  the  third  day;  that  He  would 
ultimately  "sit  upon  a  throne  of  glory,"  and 
would  "come  again,"  "in  the  glory  of  His 
Father,  with  the  Holy  Angels."  All  was  to 
happen  in  "this  generation,"  and  to  be  part  of 
the  orderly  procedure  in  the  setting  up  of  His 
kingdom.  He  bade  the  exorcised  Gadarene 
to  tell  his  friends  "how  great  things  the  Lord 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  81 

had  done  for  him,"  clearly  referring  not  to 
Himself  but  to  the  Lord  God.  In  a  spirit  of 
charity,  strangely  contrasting  the  theory  and 
method  of  the  Christian  Church  in  a  later  age, 
He  warned  His  disciples  not  to  reprove  a  re- 
former who  was  casting  out  devils  in  His 
name  simply  because  "he  followeth  not  us" 
(Mark  9:  38).  He  distinguished  between  the 
Divine  Spirit  and  Himself  by  asserting  that, 
while  a  sin  against  the  Son  of  Man  might  be 
forgiven,  "blasphemy  against  the  Holy  Ghost 
hath  never  forgiveness." 

It  was  in  keeping  with  this  modesty  of  His 
claims  that  Luke  should  tell  how,  on  a  certain 
day  when  multitudes  pressed  Him,  "the  power 
of  the  Lord  was  present  to  heal  them."  Nor 
was  there  any  incongruity  in  His  rebuke  to 
Peter,  when,  at  the  crisis  of  His  life,  He  assured 
the  doughty  apostle,  "Thinkest  thou  that  I 
can  not  now  pray  my  Father,  and  He  shall 
presently  give  me  more  than  twelve  legions  of 
angels?"  Mark  went  even  so  far  as  to  limit 
His  miracle-working  power  with  conditions  of 

success,  external  entirely  to  Himself,  in  the 
6 


82     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

declaration  that  at  Nazareth,  on  an  occasion, 
He  "could  do  no  mighty  work  (stronger  in 
the  Greek,  OUK  yduvaro,  He  was  not  able)," 
Matthew,  in  a  parallel  passage,  explaining  that 
this  was  owing  to  unbelief.  Undoubtedly, 
Luke  stated  what  was  at  once  the  general  con- 
viction of  the  disciples  and  the  Master's  own 
interpretation  of  the  success  of  His  power 
when  he  wrote,  "And  Jesus  returned,  in  the 
power  of  the  Spirit,  into  Galilee."  The  multi- 
tudes, though  not  questioning  His  claims, 
formed  the  same  conclusions  as  to  His  supe- 
riority; and  when,  after  the  utter  failure  of  the 
disciples,  the  demoniac  was  healed  by  Him, 
"they  were  all  amazed  at  the  mighty  power  of 
God."  On  the  only  occasion  recorded  when 
He  was  addressed  by  an  over-zealous  person 
in  that  strain  of  adulation  which  so  soon 
became  the  habit  of  the  Christian  Church  and 
the  keynote  of  Christian  theology,  "Blessed  is 
the  womb  that  bare  Thee  and  the  paps  which 
Thou  hast  sucked,"  He  replied  (as  earlier  in 
this  treatise  we  have  reminded  the  reader)  in 
language  of  caustic  rebuke,  "Yea,  rather, 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  83 

blessed  are  they  that  hear  the  Word  of  God 
and  keep  it!"  a  saying  which  ought  to  have 
rendered  forever  impossible  Mariolatry  and 
the  worship  of  the  crucifix. 

In  the  fourth  gospel  (John's)  Jesus  appears 
still  as  Master,  as  Physician,  as  Son  of  Man, 
as  Son  of  God,  the  Christ,  and  the  King;  but 
here,  in  addition,  He  claims  to  be  the  True 
Vine,  the  Living  Bread,  the  Door,  the  Way, 
the  Living  Resurrection,  and  the  Good  Shep- 
herd. Preeminently  He  is  the  Savior,  the 
Lifegiver.  He  is  the  .Sent,  "which  came  down 
from  Heaven"  "before  Abraham  was  I  AM!" 
He  has  "  power  to  lay  down  and  to  take  up  His 
life."  He  is  in  perfect  unison  with  the  Father, 
in  His  Spirit  and  in  His  purpose:  "I  and  the 
Father  are  One  "  (this,  in  John  10:  30,  inter- 
preted in  light  of  what  follows,  evidently 
means  that  Jesus  is  in  harmony  with  God,  and 
not  that  He  is  God,  and  notice  how  this  is 
enlarged  upon  in  14 :  10.)  "  He  is  in  Me  and  I 
in  Him."  Jesus  is  represented  as  knowing  all 
men,  He  is  to  be  "lifted  up,"  and  then,  "shall 
draw  all  men  unto  Him."  He  will  prepare  a 


84     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

place  for  His  disciples  and  then  come  again 
and  receive  them  unto  Himself.  Of  the  world 
He  will  be  the  Judge  (5:  22,  23). 

All  this  is  no  claim  to  Godhood,  for  He  tells 
His  followers  that  their  God  is  His  God,  and 
He  confesses  that  "  of  Himself  He  can  do  noth- 
ing," that  He  speaks  only  "as  He  hears," 
judging  only  as  "  the  Father  hath  taught  Him  " ; 
He  "  seeks  not  of  His  own  will,"  He  came  down 
from  Heaven  in  the  Father's  Name"  and  will 
"leave  the  world  and  return  to  the  Father." 
He  is  a  man  that  "hath  told  you  the  truth, 
which  I  have  heard  of  God."  "I  am  not 
alone,  but  I  and  the  Father  that  sent  me." 
"The  Son  can  do  nothing  of  Himself,  but  what 
He  seeth  the  Father  do."  "I  must  work  the 
works  of  Him  that  sent  me,  while  it  is  day." 
"The  works  that  I  do  in  my  Father's  Name, 
they  bear  witness  of  me."  Very  effective  is  the 
striking  confession  made  to  His  disciples  on 
that  last  night  in  which  He  was  betrayed,  "the 
words  that  I  speak  unto  you,  I  speak  not  of 
myself,  but  the  Father  that  dwelleth  in  me, 
He  doeth  the  works."  We  are  not  surprised, 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  85 

therefore,  that  at  the  grave  of  Lazarus  He 
prayed  and  gave  thanks  in  these  significant 
words,  "Father,  I  thank  Thee,  that  Thou  hast 
heard  me!"  nor  that  John  the  Baptist  is  repre- 
sented as  explaining  His  power  in  the  declara- 
tion, "For  God  giveth  not  the  Spirit  by 
measure  unto  Him!"  It  is  most  noteworthy 
that  in  all  our  Master's  discourses  there  is  no 
reference  whatever  to  an  Immaculate  Concep- 
tion, a  remarkable  nativity,  a  chorus  of  angels, 
or  a  coming  of  Magi.  Neither  Jesus,  nor  the 
disciples,  the  scribes,  nor  the  multitude,  by 
word  or  conduct,  are  recorded  as  evincing  any 
memory  or  consciousness  of  such  a  series  of 
events  antedating  His  public  ministry,  and 
which,  if  historical,  would  seemingly  have 
been  of  important  bearing  in  their  eyes 
upon  His  claims,  His  authority,  and  His  suc- 
cess. 

The  Book  of  Acts  furnishing  us  the  point  of 
view  and  the  averments  of  the  Master's  inti- 
mates, throws  light  upon  the  claims  of  Jesus 
only  less  luminous  than  His  own  remembered 
and  recorded  words.  The  author,  probably 


86      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Luke,  declares  that  it  was  through  the  Holy 
Ghost  Jesus  had  given  commandments  unto 
His  disciples  (Acts  1:2).  Peter  describes  Him 
as  a  "man  approved  of  God  among  you,  by 
miracles  and  wonders  and  signs,  which  God 
did  by  Him  in  the  midst  of  you"  —both  "Lord 
and  Christ";  "a  Prophet,  like  unto  Moses"; 
"  exalted  to  be  Prince  and  Savior  " ;  "  ordained 
of  God  to  be  Judge  of  quick  and  dead."  The 
Book  of  Acts  states  of  Paul  "that  he  preached 
Christ  in  the  synagogues,  that  He  is  the  Son 
of  God  " ; "  a  man,  whom  God  hath  ordained  " ; 
"a  Savior  of  the  seed  of  David." 

In  the  Epistles,  we  find  no  incontestable 
advance  upon  this  teaching,  the  few  passages 
which  seem  to  favor  that  apotheosis  of  the 
Master,  which  the  church  in  course  of  ages 
declared,  being  misunderstood  or  evidently 
interpolations  of  later  theology.  (1  John  5:  7 
is  clearly  an  interpolation.)  Never  is  lost  to 
sight  the  distinction  between  the  Deity  and 
our  "Lord  and  Savior  Jesus  Christ."  It  is 
not  to  be  denied  that  in  the  later  of  Paul's 
epistles  there  is  some  progress  away  from  the 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  87 

simplicity  of  the  Christology  as  given  us  in  the 
Book  of  Acts,  and  toward  those  subtle  concep- 
tions of  His  person  which  soon  prevailed  in 
the  early  Church,  as  in  1  Tim.  3:  16,  which 
seems  to  quote  a  simple  creed;  but  the  most 
striking  expressions  of  the  apostle's  glowing 
hero-worship  fall  far  short  of  the  claims  of 
the  Nicene  Creed. 

Probably  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  by  an 
unknown  author  and  subsequent  to  Paul's 
latest,  furnishes  the  most  elaborate  Christ- 
ology of  the  New  Testament,  but  even  this 
distinguishes  clearly  between  the  man  Jesus 
and  the  Eternal  God,  and  at  most,  even  in 
this  conception  of  Him,  He  is  but  the  typical 
High  Priest,  the  Intercessor,  among  creatures 
second  to  none  created. 

That  the  claims  of  Jesus,  even  when  formu- 
lated by  His  disciples  and  warmest  admirers 
when  alive,  fall  short  of  the  portrayals  of  the 
great  Christian  creeds — the  Athanasian,  the 
Nicene,  and  even  the  so-called  Apostles' — 
must  appear  on  the  surface.  Admitting  the 
credibility  of  all  the  Gospels,  and  allowing  no 


88     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

shadow  to  fall  upon  John's  sublime  concep- 
tion of  the  Christ  there  still  remains  a  yawn- 
ing gulf  between  the  Prophet's  interpretation 
of  Himself  and  the  deified  Savior  of  the  subse- 
quent ages.  The  candid  student  will  find  in 
the  gospels  a  creation  of  personality,  lumi- 
nous, intense,  unique,  but  quite  other  than  the 
metaphysical  subtlety  of  the  Nicene  creed,  of 
the  monophysite  controversy,  or  of  modern 
Trinitarian  orthodoxy. 

Though  gifted  with  prophetic  insight  to  a 
high  degree,  on  His  own  admission,  Jesus  was 
not  omniscient,  and  though  capable  of  healing 
certain  diseases  and  of  working  what  seemed 
wonders,  He  never  presumed  to  possession  of 
omnipotence.  Even  His  so-called  miracles, 
far  from  being  an  exercise  of  might  wholly 
superior  in  kind  and  intensity  to  occasional 
triumph  of  faith,  from  His  own  point  of  view 
belonged  to  a  class  of  phenomena  quite  possi- 
ble in  every  age  and  clime.  Jesus  considered 
Himself  in  regard  to  these  unusual  gifts  as  but 
one  in  a  noble  army  of  heroes  and  martyrs, 
who  were  in  wonder-working  only  his  prede- 


THE  MASTER'S  CLAIMS  89 

cessors;    and  He  anticipated  a  multitude  of 
followers  of  like  endowment. 

In  short,  Jesus  was  not,  Himself  being  the 
judge,  the  luminary  so  much  as  a  lens;  His 
soul  was  translucent,  the  Deity  streamed 
through  Him,  and  in  the  passage  the  Divine 
light  was  focused  with  great  vividness  upon 
matters  that  concerned  His  mission  and  His 
message. 

He  was  King,  but  many  kings  had  preceded 
Him  and  would  follow.  He  was  what  Homer 
styled  Agamemnon  at  Troy,  "  basileuteros," 
that  is,  "more  a  king"  than  the  other  Greek 
sovereigns. 

It  may  be  of  interest  to  place  alongside  of 
the  Prophet's  own  apprehension  of  His  per- 
sonality the  interpretation  of  a  singularly  pure 
and  spiritual  mind,  whose  Oriental  training 
and  heritage  peculiarly  fitted  him  to  under- 
stand and  to  respond  to  Jesus  of  Nazareth. 
Chunder  Sen,  a  recent  head  of  the  Brahmo 
Somaj,  drew  an  equal-sided  triangle  with  one 
apex  erect  and  thus  commented  upon  it: 
"The  apex  is  the  very  God  Jehovah,  the 


90      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Supreme  Brahma  of  the  Vedas.  Alone,  in 
His  own  Eternal  Glory  He  dwelleth.  From 
Him  comes  down  the  Son  in  a  direct  line,  an 
Emanation  of  the  Divinity.  Thus  God  de- 
scends and  touches  one  end  of  the  base  of 
humanity,  then  running  all  along  the  base 
permeates  the  world,  and  then  by  power  of 
the  Holy  Ghost  drags  humanity  to  Himself. 
Divinity  coming  down  to  humanity  is  the  Son; 
Divinity  carrying  up  humanity  is  the  Holy 
Ghost.  The  Creator,  the  Exemplar,  the  Sanc- 
tifier!  I  am,  I  love,  I  save!  The  Still  God, 
the  Journeying  God,  the  Returning  God! 
Force,  Wisdom,  Holiness!  The  True,  the 
Good,  the  Beautiful." 

We  have  now  completed  our  study  of  the 
development  of  Jesus,  of  the  dawning  of  His 
religious  consciousness,  of  His  self-discovery 
as  the  promised  Messiah,  of  His  acceptance 
of  His  so  perilous  mission,  and  of  the  nature 
of  His  resulting  claims. 

In  our  Third  Part,  we  will  discuss  the 
teachings  of  Jesus,  what  He  felt  Himself  sent 
to  communicate,  His  message. 


PART  THIRD 

WHAT  JESUS  TAUGHT 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  MESSAGE 

'TIHE  Message  of  Jesus,  which  He  Himself 
called  His  evangel,  or  glad  tidings,  and 
which  the  Anglo-Saxons  translated  into  the 
grand  old  word  "gospel"  (good  spell — joyful 
announcement),  has  been  reported  to  us  by 
the  evangelists,  as  they  are  most  properly 
called,  with  substantial  agreement,  and  yet 
from  the  same  different  points  of  view  already 
noted  in  their  portrayal  of  His  personality. 
The  synoptists  (Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke) 
give  us  the  gospel  of  the  Kingdom,  the  author 
of  John  the  gospel  of  Salvation.  The  two 
messages  are  the  same,  essentially,  but  neither 
is  just  what  is  meant  to-day  by  "gospel 
preaching,"  and  both  are  intense  with  the 
unique  personality  of  the  Herald. 

In  Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke,  the  glad 
tidings  are  summed  up  in  the  words,  "The 

93 


94     JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

time  is  fulfilled  and  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven 
is  at  hand:  repent  ye  and  believe  the  gospel." 
When  the  Twelve  were  commissioned  to  go 
forth  and  evangelize,  their  instructions  were 
only  "to  preach  the  Kingdom  and  heal  the 
sick."  The  Seventy  were  ordained  "to  heal 
the  sick  and  say  unto  the  people,  'the  King- 
dom of  God  is  nigh  unto  you."  In  the  form 
of  prayer,  "Our  Father,"  suggested  as  a  use- 
ful pattern  for  verbal  devotion,  there  is  no 
doctrinal  reference  except  to  the  Kingdom,  to 
forgiveness,  to  avoidance  of  temptation,  and 
to  deliverance  from  evil  (the  Evil  One?). 
Luke  records  that  'the  people  followed  Him, 
.  .  .  and  He  received  them  and  spake  unto 
them  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  and  healed  them 
that  had  need  of  healing."  His  last  words  to 
His  disciples  were  a  general  injunction  to 
preach  in  His  Name,  "Repentance  and  Re- 
mission of  Sins  among  all  nations."  The 
author  of  the  book  of  Acts  reports  Him  as 
promising  His  followers,  in  absolutely  His 
last  earthly  communication,  that  "ye  shall 
receive  power,  after  that  the  Holy  Ghost  is 


THE  MESSAGE  95 

come  upon  you,  and  ye  shall  be  witnesses  unto 
me,  both  in  Jerusalem  and  in  all  Judea  and 
in  Samaria,  and  unto  the  uttermost  part  of  the 
earth."  To  this,  perhaps,  ought  to  be  added 
the  communication  to  Saul  of  Tarsus,  on  the 
way  to  Damascus,  as  repeated  by  Paul  in  his 
address  before  Agrippa:  "I  have  appeared 
unto  thee  for  this  purpose,  to  make  thee  a 
minister  and  a  witness  of  these  things  which 
thou  hast  seen  and  of  those  things  in  the 
which  I  will  appear  unto  you,  to  open  their 
eyes  and  to  turn  them  from  darkness  unto 
light  and  from  the  power  of  Satan  unto  God, 
that  they  may  receive  forgiveness  of  sins  and 
inheritance  among  them  that  are  sanctified, 
by  faith  which  is  in  me." 

The  gospel  of  the  Book  of  John  does  not 
ignore  this  heralding  of  the  Kingdom,  but  it 
further  emphasizes  salvation.  The  Master 
herein  declares  the  world  lost,  and  affirms 
that  Himself  has  come  to  save.  Preeminently 
He  is  the  Savior  of  the  world,  both  from  sin 
and  from  punishment;  the  escape  is  through 
faith  and  the  result  Ionian  Life.  Indeed, 


96      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  author  explicitly  declares  that  his  account 
was  written  with  the  express  purpose  of  un- 
folding this  truth,  "But  these  things  are  writ- 
ten that  ye  might  believe  that  Jesus  is  the 
Christ,  the  Son  of  God,  and  that,  believing, 
ye  might  have  life  through  His  Name." 
Hence,  we  find  the  Master  reported  in  this 
evangel  as  saying  that  "He  came  to  bear  wit- 
ness to  the  truth,  and  that  men  through  Him 
might  have  life,  and  that  they  might  have  it 
more  abundantly."  This  life,  strictly  speak- 
ing, was  a  new  kind  of  living,  a  sort  of  spiritual 
regeneration,  resurrection  from  spiritual  death, 
attained  by  a  process  of  new  birth;  and  upon 
it,  thus  begotten  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  should 
descend  the  Spirit's  blessing  in  heavenly  influ- 
ence, working  in  the  heart  peace,  joy,  and 
love. 

There  is,  in  substance,  nothing  more  to  the 
Message.  The  evangel  of  Jesus  only  fur- 
nishes an  intense  emphasis  upon  the  funda- 
mental principles  of  universal  religion,  giving 
us  no  organized  body  of  divinity;  it  is 
simply  the  science  of  religion  applied  with 


THE  MESSAGE  97 

perfect  insight  and  sublime  faith  to  the  soul 
of  man  and  to  the  conditions  of  human  so- 
ciety. 

Of  the  Fall,  of  Total  Depravity,  of  Inability, 
of  Election,  of  Irresistible  Grace,  of  Atonement 
by  Appeasement,  of  Substitution,  and  of  similar 
metaphysical  subtleties  in  vogue  at  a  later  day, 
there  is  no  word  and  no  hint. 

Well  said  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  "Creed- 
makers  have  treated  their  Bibles  as  men  do 
sheep,  shearing  the  wool  to  make  thread, 
dyeing  the  thread  for  the  shuttle,  and  work- 
ing the  shuttle  in  the  loom,  to  create  every 
fabric  that  invention  can  conceive,  all  the 
while  declaring  that  these  fabrics  and  patterns 
all  grew  on  the  sheep's  back." 

It  does  not  follow,  of  course,  that  well- 
spun  dogmas  are  untrue,  but  only  that  these 
must  rest  for  support  on  other  evidence  than 
the  teachings  of  Jesus. 

Just  here,  however,  a  caution  is  in  order. 
There  is  some  danger  that  the  critic,  in  the 
interest  of  fairness,  will  attribute  too  much  to 

the  silences  of  the  Master.     It  must  not  be 

7 


or  THE 
UNIVERSITY 


98      JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

concluded  that  His  failure  to  speak  positively 
on  any  subject  indicated  either  ignorance,  in- 
difference, or  disbelief.  The  silences  of  Jesus, 
though  in  some  cases  no  doubt  significant, 
could  not  always  have  been  so;  often  they 
may  have  indicated  only  unwillingness  to 
illumine  dark  problems  not  yet  in  current 
discussion,  or  to  anticipate  standpoints  of 
thought  and  social,  ecclesiastical,  and  theo- 
logical conditions  of  the  remote  future.  As  the 
Master  was  far  from  being  all-seeing,  many 
problems  vital  to  us  now  may  never  have 
entered  His  conscious  scope  of  vision.  Jesus 
dealt  with  the  issues  of  the  day,  and  His 
preaching  was  the  practical  application  of 
the  eternal  principles  of  morality  and  Divine 
grace  to  common  and  every-day  situations 
and  conditions  to  be  observed  around 
Him. 

While  we  may  not  infer  his  condemnation 
of  any  doctrine  or  reform  from  His  silence 
touching  it,  neither  may  we,  presuming  upon 
our  confidence  in  the  soundness  of  our  own 
views,  ascribe  to  him  a  supposititious  advocacy 


THE  MESSAGE  99 

of  them.  Jesus  may  well  have  said  much 
more  than  what  has  been  reported — nay, 
surely  did  so  (John  21:  25);  but  to  the 
record  we  must  adhere,  and  we  are  per- 
mitted to  ascribe  to  Him  neither  more  nor 
less. 

Especially  is  it  true  that  we  are  not  justified 
in  holding  Jesus  to  what  seems  to  us  the  logical 
consequences  of  His  recorded  sayings.  The 
application  of  our  logic  to  the  Master's  teach- 
ing, and  the  consequent  additions  of  num- 
berless scholia  and  corollaries  of  our  own 
deduction,  has  wrought  wild  work  in  the 
realm  of  theology  and  in  the  unfoldings  of 
history. 

As  to  the  historical  creeds,  it  is  wholly  un- 
righteous to  claim  the  Master's  authority  for 
any  of  them,  from  the  so-called  Apostles' 
down.  Dogmas  may  seem  to  us  vital  and 
may  seem  to  spring  logically  out  of  His  sayings, 
and  on  that  account  may  be  entitled  to  all  the 
weight  which  comes  from  a  sober,  honest 
reasoning;  but  creeds  which  formulate  these 
dogmas  for  general  subscription  are  always 


100    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

inert,  to  use  Bushnell's  phrase,  "the  jerked 
meat  of  salvation."  After  long  strife,  and  in 
the  spirit  of  compromise,  were  they  drawn  up, 
and  then  only  did  they  live.  No  sooner  were 
they  embodied  than  they  became  outgrown, 
to  remain  the  fossilized  strata  of  former 
doctrinal  history,  the  evidence  of  bitter  con- 
flict, the  shibboleths  of  bigotry,  and  the 
weapons  of  savage  attack.  They  now  survive 
as  mere  forms,  and  too  often  perpetuate  the 
rancor  of  minute  disagreements  which  long 
since  ceased  to  have  even  a  theoretical  mean- 
ing. Even  their  significance  is  obscure  and 
to  be  interpreted  only  by  very  learned  scholars. 
They  are  curious  and  precious  heirlooms,  like 
the  rusty  armor  of  ancient  castles,  which  keep 
alive  memories  of  strife.  As  historical  docu- 
ments they  are  of  vast  interest  and  value,  but 
as  standards  for  subscription  they  serve  only 
to  cripple  energies  of  thought  among  the 
devout  and  to  narrow  the  range  of  their  sym- 
pathies. Just  so,  the  palaces  of  Babylon  were 
splendid  erections  of  art,  but  are  now  in  ruins 
mostly  tumbled  into  the  river,  swelling  the 


THE  MESSAGE  101 

Euphrates  in  a  swamp,  rendering  navigation 
impossible,  and  filling  the  region  with  mala- 
rial diseases;  the  debris  of  grand  discussions 
of  days  gone  by  block  the  channels  of  thought 
and  progress  and  cause  aspiration  and  sym- 
pathy to  stagnate. 

Creeds — never  meaning  more  than  they 
say,  as  their  wording  was  the  language  of  di- 
plomacy— never  meaning  as  much  even  as  they 
seem  to  say,  their  articles  having  resulted 
from  compromise  and  each  party  having 
yielded  to  the  others  verbally  so  far  as  honesty 
permitted,  and  often  farther  than  honesty  per- 
mitted— are  to  be  interpreted  with  much  read- 
ing between  the  lines,  based  on  accurate 
knowledge  of  the  circumstances  and  forces  of 
their  origination,  and  to  be  valued  for  what 
is  true  in  them.  They  should  not  be  referred 
back  to  Jesus  as  authority. 

In  the  creed-making  faculty  the  Master  was 
wholly  lacking.  He  was  a  radical,  a  dissenter 
by  inmost  nature,  a  sharp  critic  of  all  institu- 
tions and  keen  challenger  of  all  assumptions. 
Little  He  cared  for  old-time  formulas.  "Ye 


102    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

have  heard  that  it  hath  been  said  by  them  of 
olden  time,  but  I  say  unto  you  .  .  .  '  —in 
such  word  and  spirit  of  revolution  He  breathed 
forth  His  defiance  to  the  inertia  of  tradition 
and  the  bondage  of  symbols. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED 

TT  is  thus  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  Jesus 
brought  to  light  new  truths.  Indeed, 
not  one  of  the  fundamental  postulates  of  the 
religion  He  taught  was  absolutely  novel.  He 
spoke  with  authority,  but  not  to  invent  nor  to 
discover  and  only  to  emphasize  and  apply. 

His  ethical  code  was  but  that  universal  law 
of  love  which  baffles  nature's  struggle  for  ex- 
istence and  survival  of  the  fittest,  and  which 
guarantees  civilization — that  great  ethical  gen- 
eralization which  was  made  by  many  ancient 
moralists,  and  which  was  clearly  enunciated 
by  Moses,  Socrates,  Confucius,  Gautama,  and 
other  sages  of  the  olden  time.  Sophocles  had 
prayed,  "  Oh,  that  my  lot  might  be  cast  in  the 
path  of  holy  innocence  of  thought  and  deed, 
the  path  which  august  laws  ordain,  laws  which 
in  the  highest  heaven  had  their  birth,  neither 

103 


104    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

did  the  race  of  mortal  man  beget  them,  nor 
shall  oblivion  ever  put  them  to  sleep;  the  power 
of  God  is  mighty  in  them  and  groweth  not 
old!"  Cicero  had  declared,  "Virtue  herself 
ought  to  attract  you  by  her  own  charm  to  true 
glory!"  The  Golden  Rule,  at  least  in  its 
negative  form,  was  known  to  both  the  Hindoos 
and  the  Chinese.  The  Vedas  prescribed  that 
"Virtue  must  be  practised,  therefore  let  no 
one  do  to  other  what  he  would  not  have  done 
to  himself."  The  motto  of  Zoroastrianism 
was  "Think  purely,  speak  purely,  act  purely!" 
and  the  Fire-worshipers  believed  in  a  fatal 
Bridge  of  Judgment  over  which  the  souls  only 
of  the  just  could  pass  into  Paradise.  This  was 
the  clear  teaching  of  both  Buddhism  and 
Confucianism.  "It  is  the  Way  of  Tao,"  pro- 
claimed Laotse,  "to  recompense  injury  with 
kindness."  The  Japanese  have  a  very  old 
proverb  to  the  effect  "that  the  Throne  of  the 
Gods  is  upon  the  brow  of  the  righteous  man!" 
Monotheism,  the  belief  in  one  God,  was 
already,  in  Christ's  day,  thousands  of  years 
old,  while  the  Hebrews,  the  Egyptians,  and 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  105 

all  the  Aryans  had  conceived  of  Deity  as  a 
Father.  In  Egypt,  back  of  the  foolish  myth- 
ology, the  sacred  apes  and  crocodiles,  the  di- 
vine bulls  and  holy  cats,  great  spectral  truths 
loomed  up  for  the  initiated.  We  find  such 
inscriptions  as  these:  "Rock  of  Truth  is  His 
Name,"  "I  AM,  that  was  and  is  and  is  to  be, 
and  my  veil  no  mortal  hath  yet  drawn  aside." 
In  esoteric  circles  God  was  called  "Father," 
"Giver  of  Life,"  "Toucher  of  the  Hearts," 
"Searcher  of  the  inward  parts." 

In  the  Vedas,  the  Sky-God  is  Dyaus  Pitar 
(Zeus  Pater  in  the  Greek,  Jupiter  in  the  Latin 
languages),  that  is,  Sky  Father;  and  we  read, 
:<  There  is  One  Eternal  Thinker,  thinking 
non-eternal  thoughts.  He,  though  One,  ful- 
fils the  desire  of  many;  the  wise,  who  per- 
ceive Him  in  themselves,  to  them  belongs 
eternal  life,  eternal  peace." 

Plato  had  declared  of  the  Deity,  "Truth  is 
His  body  and  light  is  His  shadow;"  "In  God 
is  no  injustice  at  all,  He  is  altogether  just,  and 
there  is  nothing  more  like  Him  than  that  man 
of  us  who  is  the  most  just.  To  know  this  is 


106    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

true  wisdom  and  manhood,  and  the  ignorance 
of  this  is  too  plainly  folly  and  vice.  All  other 
kinds  of  wisdom,  which  only  seem  such,  as 
the  wisdom  of  politicians  or  the  wisdom  of 
arts,  are  coarse  and  vulgar." 

It  goes  without  saying  that  the  audiences 
which  Jesus  addressed,  nourished  as  they 
were  on  readings  from  the  book  of  Psalms, 
from  Deuteronomy  and  the  prophecies  of 
Isaiah,  found  no  novelty  in  even  a  very  lofty 
ethical  and  religious  point  of  view.  To  the 
Hebrew,  for  ages,  the  good  man  had  seemed 
a  sage,  the  bad  man  a  fool,  virtue  was  the  only 
wisdom,  and  rejection  of  the  Living  and  True 
God  mere  imbecility.  Even  the  notion  of  a 
Heavenly  Kingdom,  as  picture  of  a  reign  of 
righteousness  among  men,  far  from  being 
original  with  John  the  Baptist  and  Jesus,  was 
the  old  Hebrew  God-king  (theocratic)  concep- 
tion of  government  spiritualized.  Zoroaster 
taught  that  the  Kingdom  of  Ormutz  was  at 
hand,  and  that  "the  fulness  of  time"  having 
come,  the  age  was  to  be  judged,  Satan  cast 
out,  and  a  new  age  begun. 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  107 

Future  life  for  the  soul,  with  resurrection  of 
the  body,  were  passionate  beliefs  of  the  entire 
Egyptian  people  from  time  immemorial.  Satan 
the  Devil,  demons,  guardian  angels,  and  a  pot 
of  torture  for  the  damned,  were  familiar  and 
time-honored  ideas,  when  Jesus  was  born,  in 
the  East. 

No  marvel,  then,  if  Clement  of  Alexandria 
said  concerning  Greek  philosophy,  "  It  is  clear, 
that  the  same  God,  to  whom  we  owe  the  Old 
and  New  Testaments,  gave  also  the  Greeks 
their  Greek  philosophy,  by  which  the  Almighty 
is  glorified  among  the  Greeks."  And  Augus- 
tine, that  father  of  ultra-Calvinistic  orthodoxy, 
concluded,  "  What  is  now  called  the  Christian 
religion  existed  among  the  ancients,  and  was 
not  absent  from  the  beginning  of  the  human 
race  until  Christ  came  in  the  flesh,  from  which 
time  the  true  religion,  which  existed  already, 
began  to  be  called  Christian." 

Jesus  Himself  claimed  no  rare  originality 
as  a  Teacher,  and  in  His  doctrine  He  only 
made  advance  in  clearness  of  statement  and 
in  force  of  application  upon  those  who  had 


108    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

gone  on  before.  When  the  Jews  marveled  at 
His  utterance  and  asked,  "Whence  knoweth 
this  man  letters,  having  never  learned?" 
that  is,  "How  knoweth  this  man  learning, 
never  having  been  educated  ?"  —He  replied, 
"My  doctrine  is  not  mine,  but  His  that  sent 
me.  If  any  man  will  do  His  will,  he  shall 
know  of  the  doctrine,  whether  it  be  of  God, 
or  whether  I  speak  of  myself."  Which  could 
mean  nothing  else  but  that  He  was  uttering 
fundamental  truth,  such  as  spiritual  minds 
can  unearth. 

We  propose  now  to  analyze  the  Message, 
not  to  deduce  dogmas  by  logical  process,  but 
to  disentangle  the  threads  of  the  fabric  and 
to  compare  its  simple  elements  with  one  an- 
other and  with  the  same  or  similar  views  as 
held,  more  or  less  feebly,  by  contemporaries 
and  the  immediate  predecessors  of  the  Prophet. 

We  shall  find  the  truths  involved  very  ele- 
mental, but  of  intense  interest  when  reviewed 
with  reference  to  the  emphasis  the  Master  puts 
upon  them. 

The  first  postulate  upon  which  the  Teacher 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  109 

insisted  and  which  underlies  all  His  instruc- 
tion, is  that  inference  of  purity  and  spirituality 
inevitable  as  the  human  mind  grows  in  wis- 
dom and  in  grace  with  the  ages,  that  God 
loves! 

The  goodness  attributed  to  Deity  by  Hebrew 
prophets  and  heathen  sages  had,  after  all,  been 
only  a  view  from  a  mountain-top  seen  by  those 
who  could  climb,  and  which  these  scarce  dared 
talk  about  before  the  masses  of  men,  who  were 
incapable  of  grasping  such  esoteric  thought. 
Nothing  in  the  popular  life  of  the  Jews  ever 
had  responded  to  the  lofty  conception,  nothing 
in  Greek  or  popular  Roman  heathenism  had 
shown  its  influence.  Jesus  gave  the  thought 
to  everybody,  and  started  a  movement  toward 
personal  purity  and  piety  which  furnished  soil 
for  the  rare  seed. 

Jesus  taught  His  disciples  a  daily  prayer  to 
"Our  Father,"  and  knowing  that  this  very 
ancient  analogy  between  parental  love  and  the 
Divine  goodness  was  an  imperfect  one,  He 
improved  upon  it  by  contrasting  the  earthly 
affection  with  the  Divine:  "If  ye,  being  evil, 


110    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

know  how  to  give  good  gifts  to  your  children, 
how  much  more  your  heavenly  Father!" 

The  Prophet  must  have  known  that  in 
emphasizing  this  truth,  however  universal  to 
spirituality,  He  was  running  counter  to  the 
facts  of  experience,  counter  to  the  passions  and 
conduct  of  men,  and  in  defiance  of  the  seeming, 
the  surface  teaching  (and  surface  teaching  of 
things  is  all  that  most  men  regard)  of  natural 
law  and  occurrence.  To  write  on  the  wall  of 
a  tomb  for  the  eyes  of  dreamers  an  averment 
of  the  Fatherhood  of  God  was  one  thing,  and 
to  face  human  life  and  human  conduct  with 
such  a  dogma,  as  the  practical  norm  of  every- 
day action  and  the  perpetual  stay  of  faith, 
quite  another. 

Stop  and  think  upon  the  hardihood  of  this. 

Is  God  love  ?  A  thousand  voices  in  nature 
deny  it  even  probability;  chilling  blasts  of 
despair  would  freeze  away  its  warmth;  sorrow 
in  billows  roll  over  and  drown  it  out;  all  kinds 
of  religious  rust,  mildew,  and  blight,  eat  into, 
break  up,  and  kill.  There  even  seems  no 
planting-room  for  a  truth  like  this  in  our  busy, 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  111 

merry,  wicked,  sad,  and  weary  world.  You 
no  sooner  aver  that  God  is  Love,  than  some 
wiseacre,  some  misanthrope,  denies  it.  It  has 
been  disproved  scholastically  a  million  times 
at  least,  it  has  been  doubted  more  often 
than  the  sun  has  risen.  "Does  God  love?" 
we  are  asked,  "when  He  sends  the  earthquake 
to  overturn  the  erections  of  genius  and  to  shat- 
ter and  engulf  cities  and  villages  in  living 
burial  ?  Is  the  volcano,  belching  forth  lava 
and  suffocating  fumes,  upheaving  the  ocean  in 
tidal  waves  to  roll  death  over  the  peaceful, 
lovely  landscape  and  which  the  Psalmist  says 
comes  *  at  His  touch,'  the  voice  of  His  mercy  ? 
And  when  the  hurricane  strands  the  merchan- 
dise of  busy  seaports  and  converts  some  Gar- 
den of  Eden  into  a  howling  wilderness,  is  the 
breath  of  its  fury  the  expiration  of  His  good- 
ness? Pestilence,  famine,  and  war,  are  they 
the  thoughts  of  His  benevolence?  Where  is 
he,  who  has  not  endured  wrong  and  suffered 
pain?  When  has  any  age  been  unshadowed 
by  bloodshed,  poverty,  and  injustice?" 

Doubtless  Jesus  lost  none  of  the  force  of  this 


112    JESUS.  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

argument,  yet  He  responded,  "  God  loves;  our 
Father,  in  His  love,  puts  all  earthly  affection 
to  shame;  He  is  more  than  Father.'' 

And  everywhere,  in  all  subsequent  ages, 
faith,  when  sublimed,  has  responded  to  His 
averment  with  a  shout  of  assurance,  "Aye, 
God  is  Love  and  the  Father  more  than  a 
Father!"  All  our  churches  have  been  built 
on  this,  however  often  they  may  have  de- 
parted from  the  truth;  noble  enthusiasms  of 
every  kind  have,  since  the  Master's  day,  been 
lit  by  this  torch.  This  living  germ  of  doctrine 
has  taken  root  in  many  lands,  until  lo!  it  has 
become  a  mere  weed,  growing  by  the  wayside. 
You  can  not  prove  it.  It  is  ultimate.  You 
simply  recognize  it,  like  the  laws  of  logic 
innate  in  us.  It  must  be  true.  The  earth- 
quake may  quiver  and  the  volcano  roar,  and 
pestilence  slay  and  famine  depopulate;  men, 
in  their  nobler  moods,  find  it  not  only  easy  but 
necessary  to  believe  that  God  is  good.  It  is 
a  living  seed,  plant  it,  scatter  it,  let  it  be 
wafted  on  all  winds,  it  will  care  for  itself  and 
it  will  prevail. 


y 

* 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  113 

Jesus  no  more  invented  this  truth  than  He 
discovered  religion.  He  saw  clearly,  stated 
vividly,  and  applied  fearlessly.  It  was  the 
perceived  starting-point  for  His  glad  tidings. 

The  second  postulate  in  the  teaching  of  the 
Master  was  a  mere  corollary  of  the  first,  but 
of  supreme  importance  in  a  world  of  defective 
aims  and  unholy  motives,  namely,  that  God 
forgives! 

God  forgives! 

Here,  again,  the  Teacher  seemed  to  deny 
science  and  pervert  fact  in  the  interest  of 
optimism.  The  great  ethical  dramatists  — 
^Eschylus,  Sophocles,  Euripides  —  were  against 
Him;  popular  skepticism  despaired  of  such 
blessed  assurance.  "It  is  impossible,"  said 
ethical  science,  "for  justice  to  condone  wrong. 
Law  can  not  be  broken  with  impunity,  it  ex- 
acts the  letter  of  the  bond.  Evil  is  a  cause,  a 
karma,  and,  like  other  causes,  must  work  out 
its  own  inevitable  results.  Nemesis  is  relent- 
less, and  cruel  as  the  grave.  Forgiveness  is 

a  dream  of  the  weak  and  of  the,  wicked." 

8 


114    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Yet,  Jesus  taught  His  disciples  to  pray, 
"  Forgive  us  our  trespasses ! "  Notice  that  He 
carefully  guarded  His  utterance,  which  was  of 
that  kind  of  truth  which  easily  runs  into 
fanaticism.  He  did  not  compromise  the  Di- 
vine justice  by  any  irrational  offer  of  absolu- 
tion— no  true  prophet  ever  did  or  will.  In 
order  that  the  Divine  forgiveness  might  avail, 
Jesus  taught  that  the  seeker  was  to  "repent." 
In  pardon  of  sins  God  did  not  sacrifice  any 
moral  interest,  nor  violate  the  sanctity  of  law, 
nor  sully  the  majesty  of  government;  He  for- 
gave only  the  penitent.  No  seer  ever  de- 
nounced unsubdued  and  unrepentant  sinful- 
ness  with  keener  indignation,  nor  foretold  in 
more  vivid  imagery  its  utter  overthrow,  than 
did  the  Founder  of  the  Christian  religion. 
He  was  just  as  truly  the  Prophet  of  retribution 
as  of  salvation.  It  was  this  combination  made 
His  denunciations  so  terrible — His  gentleness 
made  more  searching  the  word  of  rebuke,  His 
intense  conception  of  the  Divine  goodness 
formed  foil,  when  indignant,  for  His  human- 
ity. The  vivid  impression  made  by  this  upon 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  115 

His  disciples  survived  in  the  startling  phrase, 
"The  wrath  of  the  Lamb." 

The  mercy  of  God  was  the  atmosphere 
which  the  righteous  breathed  in  life,  the  sun- 
shine in  which  their  souls  bathed  day  by  day. 
He  knew  of  no  perfection,  though  in  Matth. 
5:  48  he  urged  His  followers  to  be  "reieiot," 
that  is,  complete,  well  rounded  in  character; 
and  He  ever  recognized  the  imperfections  of 
all  earthly  beings,  even  the  holiest.  It  was 
not  pessimism  but  sublime  ideality  which 
caused  Him  to  assure  the  young  ruler:  "There 
is  none  good,  save  One!"  From  His  point  of 
view,  no  gentlest  saint  bowing  over  wounded 
on  field  of  battle,  no  boldest  hero  declaring  the 
truth  though  the  heavens  fall  upon  him,  no 
martyr  amid  flames  forgiving  his  persecutors, 
might  claim  before  the  Judgment  Bar  any- 
thing but  the  Divine  forbearance. 

It  is  most  significant  that  this  dogma,  that 
God  forgives,  has  outstood  the  blasts  of  twenty 
centuries  of  science,  skepticism,  and  despair. 
To-day  it  touches  the  noble  nature,  melts  the 
hard  heart,  reclaims  the  wayward  and  encour- 


116    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

ages  the  good,  just  as  in  the  days  of  Isaiah, 
just  as  in  the  times  of  Jesus.  Justice  Divine 
still  appears  to  be  not  Law  taking  vengeance 
but  Love  maintaining  Law,  and  moral  law 
itself  is  but  the  compulsion  of  love.  A  thou- 
sand treatises  in  ethics  can  not  prevent  the 
penitent  from  outstretched  hands  as  the  words 
go  forth  spontaneously,  "O  God,  Heart  of 
God,  have  mercy  upon  us!"  And  science, 
though  unable  to  explain,  bows  the  head  and 
muses. 

The  third  elemental  truth  in  the  Message 
was  that  of  Brotherhood,  expressed  in  what 
we  call  the  Golden  Rule,  and  which  simply 
insisted  that  men  should  be  just  and  merciful 
to  each  other. 

God  loves  and  will  forgive;  man  must  love 
and  forgive.  God  is  Father,  men  are  breth- 
ren. 

This  seemed  to  the  people  of  Christ's  time 
rank  nonsense.  Social  fraternity  was  as  far 
from  the  realm  of  the  practical  as  social 
equality.  Society  was  organized  into  differ- 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  117 

ences  of  position,  opportunity,  and  worth. 
There  were  rulers,  noblemen,  common  people, 
and  slaves.  Your  own  citizens  were  the  unit 
and  you  an  atom  dissolved  into  the  whole, 
of  no  consequence  except  to  the  State.  Those 
of  your  own  language  were  civilized,  and  those 
of  other  tongues  barbarians.  All  outside  your 
frontiers  were  robbers  and  pirates ;  and  it  was 
right  to  slay  them. 

And,  inside  your  own  group,  the  perpetual 
theme  of  satire's  bitterness  was  man's  inhu- 
manity to  man,  which,  then  as  always,  "made 
countless  thousands  mourn." 

For  a  Jew  to  be  told  that  he  must  love 
Pharisees,  forgive  his  Roman  oppressors,  let 
his  slave  go  free,  and  be  considerate  toward 
the  mean,  cowardly,  and  cruel  of  his  own  kin, 
must  have  appeared  to  him  the  prattle  of  a 
fool. 

Yet  upon  such  folly  Jesus  insisted  with  all 
the  moral  fervor  of  His  nature.  Once,  when 
His  mother  and  His  brethren  stood  without, 
as  He  addressed  a  throng  of  the  people,  He 
asked  the  messengers,  or  the  ushers,  "  Who  is 


118    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

my  mother?  and  who  are  my  brethren?"  as 
if  to  teach  them  that  the  spirit  of  humanity 
was  supreme  and  must  surmount  all  racial, 
national,  civic,  tribal,  and  even  family  preju- 
dice and  preference. 

One  of  the  most  noteworthy  sayings  of  the 
Teacher  put  this  with  tremendous  emphasis: 
"Whosoever  is  angry  with  his  brethren  with- 
out a  cause" — note  that  this  was  a  very  grave 
offense  on  any  ethical  standard—  "shall  be  in 
danger  of  the  judgment"  —which  was  the  local 
judicatory  (as  we  might  say,  the  County 
Court), — "and  whosoever  shall  say  to  his 
brother  Raca"  (vain  fellow,  empty  head,  a 
much  less  heinous  offense), "  shall  be  in  danger 
of  the  Council,"  which  was  the  Sanhedrim, 
the  general  and  supreme  court  of  the  land; 
"but  whosoever  shall  say,  Thou  fool" — the 
least  conceivable  offense  of  inhumanity— 
"shall  be  in  danger  of  hell-fire!"  Here,  on 
the  one  side,  we  run  down  from  wrath,  through 
abuse,  to  mere  ill  nature;  while,  on  the  other 
side  of  the  contrast,  we  run  up  from  a  local 
indictment,  through  a  national  arraignment, 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  119 

to  the  Judgment  Bar  of  the  universe.  So,  by 
ever  lessening  the  fault  and  ever  increasing 
the  liability,  the  Prophet,  with  immense 
emphasis,  condemned  the  merest  shadow  of 
inhumanity.  The  rebuke  rolls  up  from  a 
cloud  no  bigger  than  a  man's  hand  to  a  thun- 
der-storm. For  brotherhood  must  be  su- 
preme. 

A  comparison  of  the  ethical  point  of  view 
of  Jesus  with  the  standpoints  of  contemporary 
and  preceding  systems  will  prove  of  much  sig- 
nificance. His  conception  is  by  far  the  most 
comprehensive.  From  the  beginning  of  the 
world  superior  men  had  cherished  the  notion 
of  some  nobility  of  soul,  possible  to  all,  yet 
attained  only  by  a  few,  and  in  these  imper- 
fectly present — one  pearl  of  great  price,  to 
obtain  which  a  man  might  well  sell  all  that 
he  had.  They  had  given  various  names  to 
this  and  had  described  it  according  to  their 
tastes,  habits,  needs,  and  spirituality  of  con- 
ception, thereby  uttering  volumes  concerning 
their  mental  traits  and  social  proclivities. 
The  Greeks  had  named  virtue  arete,  from 


120    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Ares,  their  god  of  war;  the  Latins  had  used 
the  word  virtus,  from  vir,  a  hero.  Nobility  of 
soul  with  both  these  kindred  and  gifted  races 
was  herohood,  the  predominance  of  manly 
qualities,  warlike  prowess,  bodily  courage, 
stoical  endurance  of  pain  and  hardship,  fidel- 
ity to  the  State,  and,  in  short,  whatever  made 
the  hardy  and  victorious  soldier.  The  Greek 
philosophers,  from  a  loftier  outlook  than  that 
of  the  people  at  large,  pronounced  this  supreme 
quality  of  character  justice,  meaning  thereby 
the  harmonious  pose  of  all  powers  of  body, 
mind,  and  heart  in  perfect  symmetry  of  life; 
a  virtuous  man  was  a  living  poem,  in  faultless 
flowing  measure,  or  a  statue  of  fine  outlines. 
This  justice  was  something  that  could  be 
taught,  for  it  was  inconceivable  that  any  man 
should  persist  in  being  unnatural,  ungraceful, 
and  contradictory,  if  only  he  was  clearly  shown 
the  better  way;  vice  and  crime  were  kinds  of 
ignorance  of  the  true  harmonies  of  living. 
Hence  the  lofty  educational  mission  of  philos- 
ophy. The  Buddhists  sought  nobility  of 
soul  in  self-denial  and  a  chaste,  simple,  and 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  121 

frugal  existence.  The  Hebrews  of  the  olden 
time  described  the  soul's  nobility  by  the  word 
Wisdom,  which  was  a  kind  of  far-reaching 
prudence  in  the  conduct  of  men. 

In  Jesus,  first  of  all  moralists,  there  ap- 
peared a  complete  comprehension  of  man  as 
a  moral  being,  in  both  the  ethical  and  religious 
bearings  of  life;  and  by  Him  the  whole  matter 
was  engrossed,  and  for  all  time,  in  the  sublime 
precept,  "Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God 
with  all  thy  heart,  and  with  all  thy  mind,  and 
with  all  thy  soul,  and  with  all  thy  strength; 
and  thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbor  as  thyself." 

The  cynicism,  which  scorned  this  ideal  in 
the  days  of  Jesus,  did  not  succumb  to  His 
sublime  declaration.  The  despairing  con- 
tinued to  point  to  those  hypocrites  who  tithing 
mint  robbed  widows  and  orphans,  to  the 
wrongs  in  social  relation,  and  to  the  cruelties 
of  history;  and  when  the  scientists  came  they 
sighed  assent,  and  they  said,  "Yes,  man  is  a 
reformed  ape,  his  very  morality  but  refined 
selfishness,  his  paws  more  soft  but  his  claws 
more  sharp;  and  life  continues  to  be  a  strug- 


122    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

gle  for  existence,  only  war  veiled,  and  still  as 
brutal  as  the  growl  of  the  apeman  or  the 
scratchings  of  cats.  An  eminent  British  scien- 
tist, several  years  ago,  in  "Nature,"  declared 
that  if  he  were  required  to  give  some  logical 
ground  for  the  ideas  of  right  and  wrong,  and 
some  sufficient  reason  why  any  man  should 
not  sin  against  his  sense  of  justice  and  harm 
his  neighbor,  if  he  so  desired,  he,  for  one, 
could  not  do  it. 

Yet,  the  Golden  Rule  of  Jesus  has  held  its 
own.  Manners  have  grown  gentler  by  it, 
hard  hearts  have  softened,  cruel  ways  have 
passed  on,  private  feuds  have  ceased,  battles 
are  followed  by  mercy  toward  the  vanquished, 
slavery  dies  out,  international  law  flourishes, 
international  courtesies  multiply,  war  has 
come  to  seem  brutal  and  intolerable,  and,  in 
short,  men  on  the  average  are  kinder,  more 
generous,  and  more  just.  Nor  is  there  any 
form  of  virtue  but  that  it  assumes  sacrificial 
expression,  from  the  mother's  love  for  her 
child  and  the  hero's  suffering  for  his  country, 
and  the  martyr's  dying  for  his  faith,  down  to 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  123 

the  hidden  opening  of  the  left  hand  in  charity, 
or  the  low  utterance  of  a  mere  word  of  kind- 
ness. No  virtue  now  anywhere  but  costs 
time,  strength,  and  tears,  and  because  all 
virtue  is  some  form  of  love,  expressing  itself 
in  Christian  brotherhood.  No  doubt  these 
statements  should  be  qualified  by  the  fact  that 
increasing  light  multiplies  responsibility,  and 
that,  in  view  of  the  present  ethical  enlighten- 
ment, men  may  be,  all  things  considered,  no 
better  on  the  average  than  their  fathers  even 
of  remote  ancestry.  It  is  possible  that  a  just 
judgment  would  deal  out  to  us  as  many 
stripes  as  to  our  heathen  forebears.  But  no 
one  can  deny  that  the  fact  of  each  man's  right 
to  equality  of  opportunity  in  life  and  the  duty 
of  general  fraternity,  in  short,  the  claims  of 
Christian  brotherhood,  are  to-day  recognized 
as  never  before.  People  of  to-day  admire  the 
beautiful  face,  praise  the  brilliant  intellect, 
make  merry  over  sparkling  wit,  and  toss  their 
hats  and  shout  when  greatness  passes  by,  but 
they  reserve  their  inmost  and  prof  oundest  hom- 
age for  humanity.  Instinctively,  they  know 


124    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

that  medals  and  crosses  of  decoration  are  no 
fitting  rewards  for  benevolence,  and  so  to 
this  they  give  the  heart's  deference;  and,  al- 
though they  may  fawn  on  the  wicked  from  mo- 
tives of  fear  or  self-interest,  they  inwardly 
reprobate  their  characters,  hate  and  despise 
them. 

Fairly  judged  men  may  not,  on  the  average, 
have  improved  in  virtue,  but  the  standard  has 
risen  to  meet  the  sublimity  of  the  Master's 
conception. 

One  more  pearl  of  truth  makes  up  the  rosary 
for  faith's  repetition,  in  acceptance  of  the 
Message.  The  Teacher's  gospel  involved  sanc- 
tion, and  a  discriminative  future  for  man's 
soul.  Jesus  plainly  taught  that  there  was  life 
after  death,  and  that  the  post-mortem  existence 
was  the  ethical  sequence  of  the  earthly  career. 

Of  course,  this  was  no  more  original  with 
Jesus  than  the  other  postulates,  and  yet  there 
was  much  that  was  novel  in  the  teaching  of 
the  Master  on  this  subject. 

It  is  safe  to  say  that  when  the  Christian  era 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  125 

came  in,  no  belief  on  the  subject  of  a  future 
life  anywhere  gave  much  comfort  to  the  dying 
or  any  encouragement  to  the  well.  Vergil  did 
but  reflect  the  general  statement  of  the  most 
spiritual  of  his  compeers  when  he  caused 
Charon  to  say  to  ^Eneas,  concerning  the  un- 
derworld, "This  is  the  region  of  ghosts,  of 
sleep,  and  of  drowsy  night."  And  before  him, 
still  more  significant,  had  been  Homer's  pic- 
tures of  the  dead;  for  those  vivid  portraitures 
at  that  time  continued  to  represent  the  stand- 
ard faith  of  the  classic  world,  were  repeated 
at  every  festival  and  on  common  days  in  the 
market-place,  and  were  to  the  polite  and  to 
the  "many"  the  most  ancient  and  trustworthy 
information  on  the  subject. 

"In  eternal  cloud 

And  darkness.     Never  does  the  glorious  sun 
Look  on  them  with  his  rays;  when  he  goes  up 
Into  the  starry  sky,  nor  when  again 
He  sinks  from  heaven  to  earth.    Unwholesome  night 
O'erhangs  the  wretched  race." 

Thus  Ulysses  described  what  he  beheld  in 
the  region  of  shadows,  as  his  sacrifice  to  the 
dead  progressed: 


126    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

"Thronging  round  me  came 
Souls  of  the  dead  from  Erebus, — young  wives 
And  maids  unwedded, — men  worn  out  with  years 
And  toil, — and  virgins  of  a  tender  age, — 
In  their  new  grief, — and  many  a  warrior  slain 
In  battle,  mangled  with  the  spear,  and  clad 
In  bloody  armor;  who  all  about  the  trench 
Flitted  on  every  side,  now  here,  now  there, 

With  gibbering  cries;  and  I  grew  pale  with  fear!" 

Of  the  unburied  dead  all  antiquity  surmised 
only  the  most  distressing  restlessness.  ^Eneas 
learned  what  men  in  Vergil's  day  generally 
believed:  "They  wander  a  hundred  years  and 
flutter  about  these  shores."  Men  died  with 
courage,  with  stoicism,  with  insensibility,  but 
without  hope.  Even  Jews  of  the  olden  time 
had  asked  mournfully,  "If  a  man  die  will  he 
live  again?" 

The  rabbis  of  Jesus's  day  pictured  a  heaven 
and  a  Place  of  Torment  in  gross  imagery, 
insisting  upon  a  future  life  and  furnishing 
minute  details.  But  it  is  not  recorded  that 
even  the  most  sanctimonious  Pharisees  were 
overeager  to  venture  into  the  dark  valley, 
while  it  was  notorious  that  the  Sadducees 
laughed  to  scorn  the  dreams  of  the  clergy. 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED  127 

While  Jesus  thus  did  not  invent  the  dogma 
of  immortality,  to  use  a  biblical  phrase,  He 
"brought  it  to  light."  He  made  the  unseen 
world  real  to  faith,  and  brought  tenderly  near 
the  future,  appealing  to  faith  and  kindling 
hope.  He  showed  this  life  to  be  for  the  right- 
eous only  a : 

"Suburb  of  the  life  elysian 
Whose  portal  we  call  death!" 

For  His  followers,  that  underworld  of  the 
heathen  was  to  prove  an  upperworld — that 
region  of  shadows,  drowsiness,  shivering,  and 
pain,  a  land  of  light,  peace,  and  intense  life. 
He  converted  a  fugitive  and  timorous  philos- 
ophy into  a  lively  faith. 

As  to  the  fate  of  the  wicked,  He  invented  no 
alleviations  of  the  rabbinical  severity.  There 
would  be  Judgment,  and  so  rigid  the  standard 
and  its  application,  that  even  for  every  idle 
word  one  would  be  compelled  to  give  account, 
at  that  Day.  His  contribution  to  the  current 
conception  of  torment  was  in  one  simple  and 
thrilling  assertion,  which  was  highly  pictorial. 
He  pointed  to  Gehenna,  the  Vale  of  Hinnom, 


128    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

where  the  offal,  refuse,  and  filth  of  Jerusalem 
were  burned  up,  in  short,  to  the  city  crema- 
tory, where  the  worm  was  always  feeding,  and 
where  the  fire  of  consumption  and  purification 
never  went  out.  The  place  of  punishment 
was  a  kind  of  Gehenna,  a  Refuse  Heap,  and 
Moral  Crematory  for  lost  souls,  where  the 
waste  of  mankind,  its  personal  filth  and  refuse, 
were  to  be  cast  out  and  consumed.  What  He 
meant  to  emphasize  by  this  parable  was  the 
peril  of  wasted  opportunity.  Jesus  formu- 
lated no  clear-cut  dogma  of  endless  punish- 
ment, indeed  never  applied  the  word  endless 
to  the  future  of  the  wicked  (see  Dr.  Whiton's 
admirable  little  book,  "Is  Everlasting  Punish- 
ment Endless  ? ").  Rather,  He  took  a  dissolv- 
ing view  of  the  lost.  They  had  sinned  against 
light,  the  brute  in  them  had  throttled  the 
angel,  they  were  become  refuse,  they  should 
and  would  be  cast  out  as  rubbish. 

It  was  not  that  sin  could  not  be  forgiven, 
even  after  death  (see  Matth.  12:  32),  nor  that 
any  particular  act  or  acts  of  transgression 
deserved  so  great  overthrow;  but  simply  that 


THE  MESSAGE  ANALYZED 

nothing  could  perpetuate  itself  in  which  the 
germ  of  life  had  ceased  to  exist.  Life  was 
fatal  because  determinative  of  worth — worth 
gone  in  its  very  possibility — the  future  must 
necessarily  close  in  upon  the  waste  soul. 
Men  might  develop  graces  entitling  them  to 
perpetual  growth,  but  an  extinguished  char- 
acter meant  a  terminating  career.  They  who 
would  live  forever  must  conquer  and  grow; 
for  others,  sooner  or  later,  the  refuse  heap. 

Let  us  recapitulate.     The  postulates  of  the 
Message,  stated  in  simplest  form,  were : 
God  loves  all, 
God  forgives  the  penitent, 
Man  must  repent,  love,  and  forgive, 
A  future  of  glory  or  of  extinction. 

That  was  all!     That  was  enough! 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  GATE 

T3TJT  how  were  men  to  come  under  the 
sway  of  the  Gospel  ?  At  first  sight,  the 
standard  would  seem  to  have  been  put  far 
beyond  the  possibility  of  reach  for  mortal  and 
frail  man.  To  overcome  the  inertia  of  carnal 
security,  to  subdue  the  intractable  forces  of 
passion  and  pride,  to  discern  the  spiritual 
and  eternal,  and,  forgiving  enemies,  to  begin 
to  love  God  with  heart  and  soul,  and  mind, 
and  strength,  the  while  practising  only  charity, 
this  would  appear  to  be  a  task  more  herculean 
than  to  vanquish  armies  and  establish  em- 
pires. What  practicable  approach  was  there 
to  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  ? 

Jesus  recognized  this  difficulty  and  admitted 
that  the  Gate  was  indeed  strait.  Ordinary 
advantages  were  all  vain  to  aid  one  through. 
Even  power  and  wealth,  so  almighty  in  other 

130 


THE  GATE  131 

connections,  far  from  furnishing  help  were 
only  a  hindrance.  It  was  easier  for  a  camel 
(cable?  as  cables  were  called  camels  in  the 
Orient)  to  pass  through  the  eye  of  a  needle, 
than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  the  Kingdom,  and 
the  young  plutocrat,  who  came  sighing  for 
perfection,  if  he  would  attain,  must  sell  all  and 
give  his  substance  to  the  poor.  Still,  prosper- 
ity, by  God's  grace,  could  squeeze  through. 
But  to  have  much,  gave  one  no  leverage  on 
forgiveness. 

Moreover,  selfish  seeking  availed  nothing. 
To  desire  very  strenuously  to  pass  the  barrier 
gave  no  one  entrance,  if  the  grasping  for  sal- 
vation was  selfish.  He  who  would  save  his 
life,  for  his  life's  sake,  would  surely  lose  it. 
"  Other- worldliness"  possessed  no  merit. 

Nay,  an  unselfish  seeking  would  not  suffice; 
and  the  Master  felt  constrained  to  say,  with 
reference  to  the  gravity  of  "repentance," 
"Strive  to  enter  in  at  the  strait  gate;  for  many, 
I  say  unto  you,  will  see k  to  enter  in  and  shall 
not  be  able."  Seeking  was  not  enough;  one 
must  strive.  And  the  word  strive  here  is  in 


132    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  Greek  a  term  describing  the  violent  efforts 
of  gymnasts  to  win  prizes  at  the  public  games 
by  feats  of  skill  and  strength.  When  an 
athlete,  after  years  of  self-denying  prepara- 
tion and  months  of  special  training,  in  the 
hour  of  his  trial  put  forth  all  his  might  to 
reach  the  goal  first  in  the  foot-race,  or  to  down 
his  adversary  in  wrestling,  this  supreme  effort 
of  muscle  and  will  was  called  his  "agonia," 
his  agony.  No  one  dreamed  of  earning  the 
olive  crown  except  at  cost  of  supreme  en- 
deavor. To  seek  merely  was  to  fail,  scarcely 
more  effective  than  only  to  desire.  There 
must  be  agony.  Human  existence  was  an 
Olympic  theater,  and  the  prize  of  righteous- 
ness only  for  such  as  strove  with  grim  energy 
and  earnestness.  Seeking  did  not  suffice, 
there  must  be  strenuous  effort,  and  the  seeker 
must  "agonize." 

Jesus  enforced  this  great  truth  by  one  of 
His  parables:  "When  once  the  master  of  the 
house  hath  risen  up  and  shut  the  door,  and  ye 
begin  to  stand  without  and  to  knock  at  the 
door,  saying,  *  Lord,  Lord,  open  unto  us,'  and 


THE  GATE  133 

He  shall  answer  and  say  unto  you, '  I  know  not 
whence  ye  are,'  then  shall  ye  begin  to  say, 
*  We  have  eaten  and  drunk  in  Thy  presence, 
and  Thou  hast  taught  in  our  streets,'  but  He 
shall  say,  *I  tell  you  I  know  not  whence  ye 
are;  depart  from  me,  all  ye  workers  of  in- 
iquity.'" 

Mark,  too,  how  He  applied  the  fearful  les- 
son to  the  Pharisees  and  other  devout  and 
respectable  religionists  before  Him,  who  be- 
lieved that  they  had  inherited  salvation  with 
other  properties  and  privileges,  and  who  never 
for  a  moment  questioned  their  own  sanctity: 
"There  shall  be  weeping  and  gnashing  of 
teeth,  when  ye  see  Abraham  and  Isaac  and 
Jacob  and  all  the  prophets  in  the  Kingdom  of 
God  and  you  yourselves  thrust  out;  and  they 
shall  come  from  the  east  and  from  the  west 
and  from  the  north  and  from  the  south,  and 
shall  sit  down  in  the  Kingdom,  and  behold, 
there  are  last  which  shall  be  first  and  first 
which  shall  be  last." 

Nay,  the  Kingdom  had  brought  not  peace 
into  the  world,  but  a  sword,  and  the  entrance 


134    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

at  the  Gate  might  entail  even  bitter  separa- 
tions. As  men  went  in,  they  might  be  called 
to  leave  father  and  mother,  wife  and  child. 
Hence,  so  strong  and  all-compelling  must  the 
devotion  be,  that  natural  affections,  in  com- 
parison with  consecration  to  righteousness, 
must  seem  as  hatred. 

We  may  infer,  then,  how  far  were  the 
methods  and  temper  of  the  Master's  call  to 
men  from  those  of  our  modern  evangelists. 
To  advertise  on  flaming  posters,  to  mass  the 
devout  in  vast  multitudes,  to  entice  sinners  in 
and  then  to  subject  them  to  the  strain  of  or- 
ganized sympathies,  by  turn  charming  them 
with  delicious  choral  music  of  intensest  emo- 
tion and  terrifying  them  with  lurid  picturings 
of  hell-fire,  to  hurry  the  wavering  by  hundreds 
to  the  anxious  seat  and  then  to  railroad  them 
into  the  church,  blind,  trembling,  beside  them- 
selves, all  this  was  impossible  to  His  pensive, 
awe-struck,  unillusioned  spirit.  The  excited 
and  light-headed,  as  in  the  case  of  the  young 
man  who  came  running  unto  Him,  declaring 
that  he  would  follow  Him  whithersoever  He 


THE  GATE  135 

went,  He  discouraged  (Luke  9 :  57, 58).  Stop, 
ponder,  strip  for  the  agony!  so  He  urged  all. 
No  one  could  respond  to  His  call  without  con- 
viction and  consecration,  and  these  required 
time,  deliberation,  and  intense  earnestness. 

Jesus  gave  this  Strait  Gate  a  name.  It  was 
Repentance—  "  metanoia  "  in  the  Greek,  which, 
in  strict  interpretation  and  in  evident  mean- 
ing, was  not  grief  over  sinfulness  merely,  but 
change  of  purpose  and  attitude,  a  facing 
around.  In  urging  this  Jesus  was  saying, 
practically,  "Your  ruling  purpose  is  wrong, 
your  minds  are  deceived,  and  your  hearts  are 
corrupt.  As  you  become  my  disciples  you 
must  change  radically.  Your  sorrow  for  sin 
must  be  a  cleansing  from  it,  your  confession 
of  God  must  be  your  banishment  also  of  His 
enemy." 

There  was  nothing  new  in  this.  It  was 
David's  thought  in  the  fifty-first  psalm,  Isai- 
ah's exhortation  to  stricken  Judea,  John  the 
Baptist's  call.  The  Master  was  astonished 
that  Nicodemus  did  not  perceive  this  without 
instruction  from  Him. 


136    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Over  this  simple  immemorial  teaching  of 
the  Strait  Gate,  of  sorrow  for  sin  and  change 
of  attitude,  of  soul  reformation,  of  soul  resur- 
rection, of  new  birth,  or  whatever  you  may 
call  it,  modern  dogmatic  theology  has  piled 
a  heap  of  rubbish,  concerning  metaphysical 
ability  and  moral  inability,  effectual  calling 
and  irresistible  grace,  foreknowledge  of  free 
action  and  foreordination  of  Divine  action, 
total  depravity  and  human  helplessness, — 

"You  can  and  you  can't, 
You  will  and  you  won't, 
You'll  be  damned  if  you  do. 
You'll  be  damned  if  you  don't,"  etc. 

Until  the  puzzled  sinner  might  be  excused  for 
seeking  the  distraction  of  a  sanitarium. 

From  the  Master's  point  of  view,  "  all  things 
were  possible  with  God. 


CHAPTER  XI 
THE  WAY 

HHHE  narrow  way  was  faith.  Jesus  not 
only  proclaimed  this,  He  constantly 
put  it  into  parable,  by  incessant  deeds  of 
mercy  in  healing,  which  occasions  were  all 
eloquent  sermons  in  righteousness.  Remem- 
ber that  He  never  did  any  work  of  healing 
without  first  insisting  upon  faith,  as  the  con- 
dition not  only  of  the  cure  but  of  the  power  to 
cure ;  and  this  state  of  mind  was  not  the  sav- 
ing faith  of  the  Narrow  Way,  but  its  picture 
lesson,  its  foreshadowing  of  trust  in  the  Healer 
as  the  Sent  of  God  and  of  reformation  of  char- 
acter. 

Perhaps  the  most  instructive  of  these  occur- 
rences, as  it  certainly  is  the  most  touching, 
was  that  of  the  woman  cured  of  a  bloody  flux. 
In  this  case  the  sense  of  personal  insignifi- 
cance was  pitiable.  The  wan  creature  had 

137 


138    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

spent  all  that  she  possessed  for  health;  and 
had  become  penniless,  and  in  the  eyes  of  all 
an  invalid,  foredoomed  to  die.  Moreover, 
her  disease  was  some  form  of  hemorrhage; 
therefore  rendering  her  "unclean"  in  the 
sight  of  superstition,  and  abhorrent  to  popular 
feeling.  Her  kindest  neighbors  had  long  been 
wont  to  look  upon  her  askance,  with  that  same 
sense  of  something  uncanny  in  her  ailment 
which  ignorant  people  now  experience  in 
gazing  upon  a  lunatic.  She  was,  therefore, 
made  to  feel  herself  an  outcast,  and  as  usual 
was  suffering  in  silence  as  to  her  ills.  She 
dared  not  seek  to  come  to  speech  with  the 
Healer  as  He  was  in  the  usual  throng.  But 
she  struggled  through  the  press,  and  her  op- 
portunity at  length  arrived.  An  eddy  in  this 
sea  of  humanity  brought  her  not  far  from  His 
sacred  person,  and,  stretching  forth  her  gaunt 
hand,  one  wasted  finger  succeeded  in  touching 
a  thread  of  the  fringe  on  the  hem  of  His  mantle 
as  it  fluttered  out  behind.  In  a  moment, 
Jesus  had  stopped  and  turned,  and  the  woman, 
overcome  of  shame  and  fright,  fell  at  His  feet 


THE  WAY  139 

—to  receive  His  blessing:  "Daughter,  thy 
faith  hath  made  thee  whole,  go  in  peace!" 

All  the  healings  were  parables  of  faith. 
The  vitality  of  His  touch  was  the  Prophet's 
picture-lesson  in  the  life-giving,  soul-healing 
energy  of  the  Divine  compassion.  So,  just 
so,  God's  touch  thrilled,  healed,  and  saved. 

It  is  unfortunate  that,  in  English,  we  have 
no  verb  to  correspond  to  our  noun  faith.  In 
the  New  Testament  Greek,  the  noun  and  verb 
are  from  the  same  root  and  essentially  identi- 
cal. It  is  a  pity  we  can  not  translate  scrip- 
ture thus :  "  Whosoever  f  aitheth  Him  shall  not 
perish,"  etc.  The  Way  is  no  mere  belief, 
any  more  than  the  Gate  is  mere  seeking;  and 
as  seeking  is  not  enough  for  entrance  into  Life, 
so  belief  fails  to  fit  one  for  the  "Only  Liv- 
ing and  True  Way."  "The  devils  believe  and 
tremble."  Disciples  must  faith  their  Master 
and  must  faith  God.  Faith  is  emotional,  a 
perpetual  frame  of  disposition,  a  path  to  walk 
in,  the  channel  of  all  spiritual  action. 

Nowhere,  in  the  annals,  is  the  progress  of 
the  soul  along  the  way  of  faith  so  vividly  illus- 


140    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

trated  as  in  the  story  of  the  woman  of  the  city 
who  ventured  into  the  house  of  Simon  the 
Pharisee,  to  the  feet  of  Jesus,  as  he  reclined  at 
the  table,  on  a  couch,  Roman  fashion,  among 
other  guests.  No  virtuous  woman  could  have 
so  defied  propriety  and  saved  her  good  name, 
but,  alas,  this  weeping  girl  was  concerned  with 
virtue  only  to  mourn  its  loss,  and  had  no  good 
name  to  safeguard.  Her  very  degradation 
gave  her  impunity.  Nameless,  portionless, 
hopeless,  she  had  nothing  to  lose  and  nothing 
to  fear,  the  worst  had  come  upon  her,  and  all 
possible  future  ills  were  not  so  terrible  as  this 
evil  past  and  the  hell  of  torment  in  her  own 
heart.  She  knew  that  none  in  the  company 
would  offer  her  sign  of  recognition,  in  that 
Presence,  though  many  of  those  present  may 
have  known  her  but  too  well — not  even  a 
paramour  would  now  suffer  her  to  touch  the 
hem  of  His  garment.  She  might  be  driven 
forth  with  curses  by  slaves,  and  perhaps  the 
very  dogs  set  upon  her.  But  she  must  not 
pause;  this  millstone  about  her  neck  was 
strangling  her  life  and  pulling  her  down  to 


THE  WAY  141 

death  and  the  flaming  Gehenna.  Death?  ah! 
it  were  a  sweet  thought  but  for  conscience  and 
its  pointed  finger  of  scorn  and  judgment! 
Perhaps  she  murmured  these  thoughts  of  the 
poet,  if  in  simpler  words,  uttered  by  the  guilty 
queen : 

"Shall  I  kill  myself? 
What  help  in  that,  I  can  not  kill  my  sin, 
If  soul  be  soul;  nor  can  I  kill  my  shame: 
No,  nor  by  living  can  I  live  it  down. 
The  days  will  grow  to  weeks,  the  weeks  to  months, 
The  months  will  add  themselves  and  make  the  years, 
The  years  will  roll  into  the  centuries, 
And  mine  will  ever  be  a  name  of  scorn." 

But  there  is  a  ray  of  hope  for  this  Magdalen, 
for  Jesus  is  yonder,  and  perhaps  she  can  creep 
to  His  feet.  He  only,  of  all  men,  is  pitiful;  He 
only  can  understand;  He  may  be  moved  to 
mercy.  Has  He  not  said  to  the  very  slaves, 
"Come  unto  me  and  I  will  give  you  rest"! 
Somehow,  by  the  working  of  God's  Spirit,  in 
self-discovery,  self-struggle,  and  deep  agony  of 
contrition,  she  passes  the  Gate,  and  by  faith 
enters  the  Way,  as  she  sinks  at  His  feet  in  a 
passion  of  tears. 


CHAPTER  XII 
LIFE 

Strait  Gate  and  the  Narrow  Way  led 
to  Life,  and  this  word  Life  was  ever  on 
the  Master's  lips.  "I  am  come,  that  they 
might  have  life  and  that  they  might  have  it 
more  abundantly."  Over  the  impenitent  He 
sighed,  "Ye  would  not  come  unto  me,  that  ye 
might  have  life."  John,  the  Apostle,  who  of 
all  the  immediate  followers  seems  most  fully 
to  have  breathed  in  the  Master's  spirituality, 
viewed  the  Christian  career  chiefly  from  this 
standpoint,  and  his  first  epistle  is  little  else 
than  an  essay  on  Eternal  Life.  The  keynote 
to  that  profound,  wise,  tender,  and  very  simple 
letter  to  the  churches  is  found  in  these  senti- 
ments: "God  hath  given  us  Eternal  Life,  and 
this  Life  is  in  His  Son!"  "He  that  hath  the 
Son  hath  Life,  and  he  that  hath  not  the  Son 
of  God  hath  not  Life!"  "These  things  have 
I  written  unto  you,  that  believe  on  the  Name 

142 


LIFE  143 

of  the  Son  of  God,  that  ye  may  know  that  ye 
have  Eternal  Life." 

On  one  occasion  Jesus  defined  this  kind  of 
life:  "This  is  Life  Eternal,  that  they  might 
know  Thee  and  Jesus  Christ,  whom  Thou 
hast  sent." 

The  notion  involved  in  eternal,  or  "seonian," 
which  is  the  Greek  adjective,  then,  was  not 
existence,  however  vastly  prolonged  in  time, 
so  much  as  a  quality  and  quantity  of  existence 
—life  which  endures  of  its  own  vitality,  a 
heavenly  mode  of  revival  and  survival — a  vital 
knowledge  of  the  Deity  and  time-long  soul- 
deep  communion  with  Him.  Nearly  fifty 
times  is  the  adjective  aeonian  used  to  describe 
Christian  character  in  the  New  Testament. 
In  one  place  it  is  termed  "the  Life  of  God," 
where  the  phraze  means  a  kind  of  Divine 
vitality  in  man.  And  then,  abundantly,  we 
have  derivative  figures  of  speech,  which,  if  not 
all  from  the  Master's  lips,  were  the  natural 
outgrowth  of  His  frequent  utterance  along 
these  lines.  The  Narrow  Way  is  also  the 
Way  of  Life,  the  Roll  recording  the  names  of 


144    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

those  who  enter  in  is  the  Book  of  Life,  while 
for  such  as  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteous- 
ness there  is  Bread  of  Life  and  Water  of  Life; 
and  by-and-by  a  Crown  of  Life,  a  Tree  of 
Life,  and  a  River  of  the  Water  of  Life. 

Now  what,  in  the  concrete,  was  this  seonian 
life,  and  how  did  it  manifest  itself  in  char- 
acter and  conduct  ?  An  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion will  give  us  much  insight  into  the  aim  of 
Jesus  in  preaching,  healing,  and  suffering.  A 
close  study  of  the  teaching  of  the  Gospel  will 
inform  us  that  seonian  life  showed  itself  in 
three  ways. 

First,  by  its  prayerfulness.  True  disciples 
were  not  only  prayerful,  they  lived  prayer. 
Prayer  was  the  atmosphere  they  breathed, 
and  communion  with  God  was  a  daily  habit. 
Of  course,  there  was  no  empty  formalism 
about  this.  Play-actor  devotions  on  the  street 
corners  might  secure  a  reward,  but  not  from 
God.  The  mere  machinery  of  prayer  was 
utterly  vain  to  stir  Heaven;  phylacteries  well 
written  up  were  no  better  than  other  sorcerers' 


LIFE  145 

charms.  Prayer-mills  were  no  more  effective 
for  blessing  than  grist-mills.  No  one  was 
safer  who,  to  use  Shakespeare's  quaint  words, 
"  being  affrighted,  swears  a  prayer  or  two  and 
sleeps  again."  On  the  other  hand,  devout- 
ness  really  earnest  conferred  great  personal 
power,  power  to  work  wonders,  to  accomplish 
deeds  of  mercy,  to  engage  cheerfully  in  pain- 
ful unselfishness.  Peace  of  mind  came  only 
from  this  close  walk  with  God,  and  whoso  had 
Life  possessed  contentment,  assurance,  and 
quiet  of  spirit.  Bishop  Alford,  in  his  well- 
known  hymn,  has  tenderly  unfolded  the  Mas- 
ter's teaching  at  this  point: 

"Lord,  what  a  change  within  us  one  short  hour 

Spent  in  Thy  presence  doth  avail  to  make, 
What  heavy  burdens  from  our  bosom  take! 

We  kneel  how  weak,  we  rise  how  full  of  power; 
We  kneel  and  all  around  us  seems  to  lower; 

We  rise  and  all  the  distant  and  the  near 
Stands  out  in  sunny  outline,  brave  and  clear! 

Why  then  should  we  do  ourselves  this  wrong, 
Or  others,  that  we  are  not  always  strong, 

That  we  are  ever  overcome  with  care, 
That  we  should  ever  weak  or  feeble  be, 

Anxious  or  troubled  while  with  us  is  prayer, 
And  rest  and  peace  and  comfort  are  with  Thee." 
10 


146    JESUS;  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

The  second  essential  in  the  practical  side  of 
the  Master's  conception  of  genuine  Christian 
character  was  self-denial.  Jesus  knew  of  no 
virtue  that  was  not  a  form  of  giving,  which 
did  not  forgive  its  enemies,  forget  its  own,  and 
live  for  others.  JEonian  life  in  a  man  made 
him  surrender  self  to  higher  aims  not  selfish, 
and  he  became  a  whole  burnt-offering  on  an 
altar.  Ordinary  living  was  but  a  struggle  for 
existence,  a  survival  of  the  fittest,  after  dire 
clashing  of  interests;  but  seonian  life  was 
death  to  selfishness,  death  to  the  world,  the 
flesh,  and  the  devil  in  one's  heart.  Whoso 
had  life  forgave  debts,  prayed  for  persecutors, 
loaned  without  interest,  gave  without  hope  of 
return. 

The  Christian  idea  of  giving  was  full  of  mean- 
ing. It  involved  at  once  the  disinterestedness 
of  the  donor  and  a  real  benefit  conferred  upon 
the  recipient.  The  world,  from  time  immemo- 
rial, had  been  used  to  gratuities;  royal  bounty 
had  for  ages  been  as  common  a  notion  as  royal 
power,  and  kings,  as  they  rode  out  amid  the 
multitudes  their  own  extravagance  and  luxury 


LIFE  147 

were  beggaring,  were  wont  to  have  with  them 
almoners,  who  ostentatiously  scattered  coins. 
The  rich  were  surrounded  by  a  rabble  of  poor 
wretches,  who  lay  at  the  gates,  or  followed  at 
their  heels,  and  ate  the  crumbs  of  their  prodi- 
gality. The  great  often  patronized  art,  and  a 
Horace  or  a  Vergil  was  dependent  upon  the 
alms  of  some  grandee,  while  every  aristocrat 
in  Rome  had  his  clients  who  looked  to  him  for 
occasional  protection  and  legal  aid.  More- 
over, all  diplomacy  involved  present-making, 
and  there  could  be  no  visit,  marriage,  or 
league  perfected  without  gratuity.  But  noth- 
ing of  this  was  the  Master's  idea  of  giving. 
What  was  that  bounty  of  kings  but  a  prudent, 
showy  return  of  a  few  handfuls  of  the  count- 
less treasure  wrung  by  oppression  from  their 
wretched  subjects,  rapacity  eager  to  win  also 
the  name  of  virtue  while  enjoying  the  fat 
harvests  of  vice  ?  What  was  the  munificence 
of  the  rich  but  the  breeding-place  of  vice, 
generating  paupers,  corrupting  society  ?  The 
patron  of  art  only  made  literature  subservient 
and  poets  and  painters  sycophants.  Diplo- 


148    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

macy  between  nations  was  not  generous,  mar- 
riages between  families  were  for  convenience, 
leagues  between  confederates  were  for  selfish 
protection  and  safe  plunder,  and  the  whole 
ancient  system  of  gratuity,  as  is  any  system 
but  that  of  seonian  life,  was  coarse,  selfish,  and 
demoralizing.  The  giving  encouraged  by  seon- 
ian life  was  what  Paul  called  Charisma,  that 
is,  gracious  bestowal — the  offering  of  a  heart 
all  self -forgetting  and  eager  to  do  good  for  its 
own  sake — not  glittering  sham  like  the  scat- 
tered coins  of  monarchs;  nor  like  the  bounty 
of  nobles,  a  golden  chain  for  the  neck  of  genius; 
nor  alms  to  the  idle  and  vicious  to  make  them 
more  so,  a  benediction  on  folly,  not  the  price 
of  a  profitable  contract  of  marriage  convert- 
ing love  into  avarice,  but  charisma,  love  with 
proffered  hand  and  whole  soul. 

The  third  characteristic  of  seonian  life  was 
Action.  To  commune  with  God  and  to  love 
unselfishly  must  be  balanced  with  holy  action. 
"Follow  me!"  was  the  constant  cry  of  the 
Master.  "Sell  all,  give,  but  also  come!" 
"Go  thou,  and  preach  the  Kingdom  of  God!" 


LIFE  149 

So  He  urged  the  luxurious,  the  maker  of  ex- 
cuses, and  every  awakened  one  who  had 
entered  the  Gate  and  was  walking  in  the 
Way. 

Spiritual  gifts  were  talents,  of  which  some 
men  received  more  and  other  men  less;  but 
no  man  must  bury  what  he  was  given.  If  not 
productive,  the  talents  were  misused,  and,  if 
uninvested,  would  shrivel,  be  squandered,  and 
lost.  Believers  were  to  be  lights  in  the  world, 
the  salt  of  the  earth,  a  leaven  of  godliness,  to 
leaven  the  crude  lamp  of  humanity,  purifying 
fire.  To  lay  up  treasure  for  self  in  an  exist- 
ence of  spiritual  laziness,  showed  not  seonian 
life,  but  seonian  death. 

One  might  have  to  forsake  father  and 
mother,  wife  and  child,  might  have  to  forego 
home  and  wealth,  yea,  be  called  to  suffer 
martyrdom.  No  share  in  aeonian  life  had 
that  cowardice  which  shrank  from  danger, 
that  laziness  which  scorned  work,  nor  that 
despondency  which  whines  over  hardship. 
In  matters  of  moral  and  religious  decision,  the 
line  of  least  resistance  was  viewed  by  the 


150    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Master  as  the  pathway  of  the  weakling  and 
the  knave.  It  was  the  petulance  of  a  child, 
the  impatience  of  the  thoughtless,  the  insur- 
rectionary mood  of  the  ungrateful,  to  sigh  for 
a  bed  among  lilies  or  a  throne  in  a  palace. 

Such  was  seonian  life  in  a  human  soul- 
communion  with  God,  oblivion  of  self,  and 
sublime  action  in  right-doing,  regardless  of 
consequences. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  COMING  JESUS 

/7J.ENIUS  often  fails  to  perceive  the  sublimity 
of  its  own  sweep  of  vision.  God  uses 
men  to  do  that,  the  end  whereof  is  hidden  from 
them. 

Thus,  Luther  never  escaped  his  inherited 
reverence  for  the  German  nobility  as  rulers 
by  right  divine,  nor  did  he  ever  free  himself 
from  profound  abasement  in  presence  of  ec- 
clesiastical authority  when  rightly  constituted, 
according  to  his  own  ideas.  This  was  innate 
to  his  peasant  blood.  He  fought  abuses  and 
not  institutions,  in  conscience,  not  in  irrever- 
ence. Yet  the  logical  result  of  his  heroism 
was  civil  equality  and  religious  liberty.  He 
built  better  than  he  knew. 

Goethe  admitted  that  he  did  not  possess  the 
key  to  the  full  meaning  of  Wilhelm  Meister, 

151 


152    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

in  the  seeming  belief  that  he  was  urged  on  to 
his  literary  work  by  a  power  within,  not  fully 
comprehended  by  his  conscious  mind;  and 
Emerson  was  unable  to  tell,  at  a  later  day, 
what  many  of  his  earlier  mystical  sayings 
originally  signified.  Both  men  were  sublimely 
great,  seers  who  could  not  always  interpret 
their  own  visions. 

So  with  most  prophetic  natures,  they  do  not 
read  all  the  meanings  of  their  own  inspiration ; 
their  voices  utter  marvels  that  seem  to  their 
own  ears  an  unknown  tongue.  What  we  call 
creative  minds  are,  after  all,  themselves  in  the 
line  of  cause  and  effect,  mere  agents  of  a 
cosmic  thinking  which  transcends  human  in- 
genuity. 

Jesus  was,  to  some  extent,  an  exception  to  this 
rule.  To  be  sure,  He  Himself  confessed  that 
He  "knew  not  the  day,"  and  yet  He  persist- 
ently projected  His  personality  into  the  future. 
The  future  was  His  own.  The  secret  of  the 
world  He  should  reveal.  The  redemption  of 
society  He  should  accomplish.  Constantly  He 
avers  that  He  "shall  come."  There  need  be 


THE  COMING  JESUS  153 

no  doubt  as  to  His  mission,  for  He  was  the 
Sent  and  "Who  was  to  come,"  and  the  King- 
dom was  at  hand  and  among  them,  and, 
though  He  must  die,  still  would  He  "come," 
and  the  Kingdom  still  should  come  and  come. 
When  He  commissioned  the  Twelve  as  evan- 
gelists, it  was  with  the  promise,  "Ye  shall  not 
have  gone  over  the  cities  of  Israel,  until  the 
Son  of  Man  be  come."  When  He  instituted 
the  supper  at  the  Paschal  feast,  He  declared, 
"I  will  not  henceforth  drink  of  the  fruit  of  the 
vine,  until  that  day  when  I  drink  it  new  with 
you,  in  my  Father's  Kingdom."  He  was  to 
come  with  "power  and  great  glory,  with  His 
angels,  in  the  glory  of  the  Father,  to  reward 
every  man,  according  to  his  works."  He 
would  ever  be  with  His  disciples,  in  holy 
presence,  "all  the  days,  even  unto  the  end  of 
the  world."  His  Coming  should  be  as  light- 
ning, and  Himself  as  a  householder  gone  into 
a  far  country  to  return  again  unexpectedly. 
In  His  Coming  He  should  judge  all  nations. 
And  all  this  was  to  happen  in  this  generation, 
and  some  then  living  should  see  the  glori- 


154    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

ous  consummation.*  Their  watchwords  were 
therefore  to  be,  "  He  cometh !  Watch ! " 

That  these  predictions  were  no  interpola- 
tions, shoved  into  the  text  by  subsequent 
enthusiasm,  appears  in  the  fact  that  the  apos- 
tles, after  the  death  of  their  Master,  immedi- 
ately showed  themselves  completely  possessed 
by  this  series  of  thoughts.  Their  battle-cries 
were,  "He  has  come!"  and  "Behold!  He 
cometh!"  and  each  one  of  them  hoped  to  be 
of  the  fortunate  who  would  survive  to  see 
these  things  fulfilled,  f 

And  subsequent  ages  have  wept  and  laughed 
— wept  in  grief  of  hope  deferred,  laughed  in 
scorn  of  prophecy  made  vain. 

*Math.  10:23,  16:28,24:34,  26:29;  Mark  9:1;  Luke  21: 
32;  John  16:16,  23  ("a  little  while");  1  Cor.  7:29,  31; 
1  Thess.  4:15. 

1 1  Cor.  7:29;  1  Thess.  4:15,  5:2 


CHAPTER  XIV 

IN  THESE  TEACHINGS  WAS  JESUS  A 
DISCIPLE  OF  GAUTAMA? 


first  Catholic  missionaries  who  went 
into  Tibet  were  astonished  to  find  the 
worship  of  that  country  an  exact  parody  of 
their  own  Romish  theology  and  ritual.  There 
were  popes,  bishops,  abbots,  monks,  and  nuns ; 
temples,  monasteries,  and  convents;  bells  and 
rosaries;  images  and  holy  water;  feast  days 
and  processions.  The  priests  were  shaven  and 
held  confessional.  In  the  native  creed  was 
taught  an  Incarnate  God-man,  a  worshiped 
Virgin,  and  a  Purgatory;  while,  as  in  Italy, 
the  government  was  despotic,  ecclesiastics 
numerous,  idle,  and  lazy,  thought  suppressed, 
and  the  populace  kept  poor  and  ignorant. 

This  was  Buddhism  gone  to  decay,  and  it 
was  marvelously  like  the  corrupt  Christianity 
the  missionaries  had  brought  with  them. 

While  those  dismayed  priests  were  crossing 

155 


156    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

themselves  and  reporting  to  Rome  that  Satan 
had  surely  prepared  for  their  confusion  a 
mockery  of  the  true  faith,  European  scholars 
fell  to  work  upon  the  more  subtle  likenesses 
of  the  two  systems  which  underlay  the  super- 
ficial similarity,  and  there  resulted  a  scholastic 
surprise  as  keen  as  the  horror  of  the  ecclesias- 
tics. It  was  found  that  not  only  the  super- 
ficial adjuncts  and  excrescences  of  the  two 
beliefs  touched  at  innumerable  points,  but  that 
in  many  essentials  of  dogma  and  method  they 
ran  parallel.  Since  which  time  the  title  of 
this  chapter  has  been  one  of  the  world  problems 
of  religious  history. 

To  make  this  plain,  we  must  remind  the 
reader  of  a  few  now  well-known  facts  in  the 
story  of  the  rise  of  Buddhism.  It  came  as  a 
reformation  of  Brahmanism,  in  India,  about 
four  hundred  years  before  the  time  of  Christ. 
The  founder  was  Gautama,  a  prince  of  an 
ancient  line  of  rajahs,  who  had  spent  his 
youth  in  the  luxury  common  at  courts,  and 
who,  at  thirty,  not  strange  to  relate,  was  worn 
by  dissipation  and  weary  of  life.  Possessed 


JESUS  A  DISCIPLE  OF  GAUTAMA?     157 

of  a  naturally  refined  disposition,  the  pleasures 
of  the  palace  satiated  and  disgusted  him,  and 
in  this  mood  he  began  to  observe  the  ills 
afflicting  the  common  people.  He  commenced 
to  spend  his  time  brooding  over  human  misery, 
over  disease,  and  over  death.  An  ineffable 
pity  for  his  kind  sighed  deeply  within  him. 
He  went  apart  to  think  out  this  dark  problem, 
he  mused,  he  fell  into  deepest  reverie,  he  com- 
menced to  see  visions,  he  heard  a  call  from 
within,  he  left  all,  he  fled.  Having  taken  a 
covert  farewell  of  his  young  wife  and  babe, 
whom  he  loved,  with  some  hope  of  a  return 
in  the  indefinite  future,  like  Jesus  he  went 
into  the  wilderness  to  wrestle  undisturbed 
with  himself,  with  the  problems  of  life,  and 
with  the  demands  of  duty.  In  time,  self  con- 
quered, the  world  in  him  subdued,  his  soul 
triumphant,  he  came  forth  from  solitude,  calm 
and  resolute,  as  did  Jesus  from  the  wilds  of 
Judaea,  and  calm  and  resolute  he  preached  a 
new  religion  and  turned  a  wide  world  upside 
down.  The  dawning  consciousness  of  mis- 
sion, the  call,  the  struggle,  the  decision,  the 


158    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

proclamation — it  all  occurred  almost  precisely 
as  with  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth,  four  centuries 
before  Mary  of  Bethany  laid  her  babe  in  a 
manger  at  the  inn  of  Bethlehem.  To-day, 
one-third  of  the  human  race  are  named  after 
him  and  more  or  less  conscientiously  attempt 
to  carry  out  his  system. 

Buddhism,  in  essence,  consists  of  a  dogma 
and  of  a  life. 

Its  dogma  is  simply  this,  that  existence  is 
an  intolerable  burden,  cursed  by  Karma,  the 
germ  of  evil.  Karma  is  result,  moral  causal- 
ity, and  produces  seeds  of  its  own  in  successive 
disaster,  and  from  it  there  is  no  escape.  Death 
only  prolongs  the  situation,  as,  after  demise, 
we  shall  exist  still  in  some  material  form,  sub- 
ject to  Karma  and  reaping  as  we  have  sown. 
To  be  slain,  to  commit  suicide,  or  to  die, 
therefore,  neither  cleanses  nor  delivers.  As 
Omar  Khayyam,  in  the  Rubaiyat,  puts  it, 

"We  are  no  other  than  a  row 
Of  magic  shadow  shapes  that  come  and  go." 

And  the  coming  and  the  going  are  woe,  and  we 
but  shadows  in  shadow! 


JESUS  A  DISCIPLE  OF  GAUTAMA?     159 

A  sad  parable  well  illustrates  the  melancholy 
pervading  this  system.  A  young  mother  lost 
by  death  her  only  child,  and  startled,  horror- 
struck,  and  trembling,  she  gathered  the  cold 
little  body  to  her  bosom  and,  hurrying  through 
the  city,  entreated  every  one  she  met  to  give 
her  medicine  which  might  restore  her  darling 
to  life.  Among  others  she  encountered  Gau- 
tama. "  Lord  and  Master,  give  me  some  med- 
icine for  my  child!"  she  besought  in  tears  and 
sobs.  He  bade  her  bring  him  a  handful  of 
mustard  from  some  house  in  which  no  child, 
parent,  wife,  nor  husband  had  died.  She  went 
in  feverish  search,  but  she  found  that  in  every 
house  death  had  preceded  her.  All,  in  sub- 
stance, said  to  her,  "Lady,  the  living  are  few, 
the  dead  are  many."  At  last  the  truth  dawned 
upon  her  mind,  and,  laying  away  her  baby 
boy,  she  returned  to  the  prophet  and  bowed 
herself  in  silent  agony  before  him,  and  he 
compassionately  said:  "Lady,  you  thought 
that  you  alone  had  lost  a  son;  the  law  of  death 
is  upon  all  living  creatures,  there  is  nothing 
that  abides!"  "Our  life  is  as  a  drop  that 


160    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

trembles  on  the  lotus  leaf,  fleeting  and  quickly 
gone." 

Heaven's  best  boon  is  to  die,  once  for  all 
and  forever,  and  never  to  return  to  earth  to 
wrestle  with  Karma.  But,  alas!  this  is  the 
attainment  only  of  highest  righteousness! 
This  supreme  aim  of  effort,  this  only  real  and 
lasting  felicity,  is  Nirvana,  that  is,  personal 
extinction,  which  ceases  to  Become  and  then 
only  IS.  To  sink,  at  last,  into  blissful  uncon- 
sciousness, this  alone  shall  ease  the  ache  of 
existence. 

And  none  may  attain  even  this,  though  he 
reappear  and  vanish  under  countless  succes- 
sive forms,  unless  he  walk  long  time  in  the 
Holy  Life. 

In  this  Holy  Life,  there  are  four  paths  one 
must  successively  trace. 

First,  the  heart  must  awaken.  One's  mis- 
ery must  be  plainly  seen  and  brooded  over; 
relief  must  be  desired  and  sought. 

Second,  the  soul  must  be  converted,  forsak- 
ing all  impure  desires,  every  revengeful  feeling 
and  each  evil  work. 


JESUS  A  DISCIPLE  OF  GAUTAMA?     161 

Third,  the  converted  soul  must  renounce 
ever  more  and  more  completely  gross  desire, 
ignorance,  heresy,  unkindness,  and  even  vexa- 
tion, and  must  win  universal  charity.  These 
are  some  of  the  mottoes  describing  this  growth 
in  grace:  "Never  in  this  world  does  hatred 
cease  by  hatred — hatred  ceases  by  love!" 
"  One  may  conquer  a  thousand  men  in  battle, 
but  he  who  conquers  himself  is  the  greatest 
victor."  "  Let  a  man  overcome  anger  by  kind- 
ness, evil  by  good  will."  "As  long  as  sin  bears 
no  fruit  the  fool  thinks  it  honey;  but  when  sin 
ripens,  then,  indeed,  he  goes  down  in  sorrow." 

Last  of  all,  in  the  walk  of  the  Holy  Life,  the 
sanctified  soul  enters  the  pathway  of  extinc- 
tion through  a  final  death  of  the  body,  the  evil 
dream  of  life  ceases  in  blissful  awakening,  and 
one's  being  sinks  into  the  ocean  of  blissful 
and  unconscious — should  we  not  say  subcon- 
scious ? — rest;  and  the  heaven  of  the  blessed  is 
the  kind  of  slumber  Hamlet  longed  for,  a  sleep 
undisturbed  by  nightmare. 

Here,  then,  we  have  Awakening,  Conver- 
sion, Sanctification,  and  Bliss — a  holy  life  be- 
11 


162    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

ginning  in   despair  and  ending  in   personal 
oblivion. 

It  has  been  claimed  that  in  all  this  we  may 
find  anticipation  of  Christian  doctrine,  and 
possibly  a  wellspring  of  our  own  Master's 
inspiration.  The  resemblances  are  undenia- 
bly startling.  It  must  be  confessed  by  can- 
dor that  oriental  influence  over  the  education 
and  thinking  of  Jesus  can  not  be  positively 
excluded  from  theories  of  his  sources  of  thought 
and  method.  It  is  improbable  that  Judaea, 
at  the  opening  of  the  Christian  era,  was  igno- 
rant of  the  tenets  of  Buddhism  or  entirely  be- 
yond the  sway  of  the  sublime  truths  it  taught. 
Both  dogmas  and  theories  of  life  must  have 
come  on  channels  of  commerce  from  the  far 
Orient;  nay,  it  would  take  some  mental  hardi- 
hood to  even  question  that  advocates,  ex- 
pounders, or,  possibly,  missionaries  of  Eastern 
faiths  may  have  lived  in  Galilee.  We  have  no 
means  of  proving  that  Jesus  did  not,  during 
the  long  period  between  His  childhood  and 
His  illumination,  come  under  the  influence  of 
one  or  more  such  teachers. 


JESUS  A  DISCIPLE  OF  GAUTAMA?     163 

Still  this  is  not  necessary  for  even  a  ration- 
alistic explanation  of  the  phenomenon— Jesus 
of  Nazareth.  There  was  nothing  in  the  above 
outlined  Buddhist  scheme  of  instruction  and 
belief  not  set  forth,  albeit  obscurely,  by  the 
Hebrew  prophets,  nor  which  a  few  spiritually 
minded  people  were  undoubtedly  then  believ- 
ing and  teaching.  No  missionary  from  India 
was  needed  in  order  to  instruct  the  young  Nabi 
as  to  awakening,  conversion,  and  sanctifica- 
tion,  knowledge  of  all  which  might  easily  be 
acquired  from  Isaiah,  from  the  Psalms,  or 
from  John  the  Baptist.  Something  of  defi- 
niteness,  something  of  phraseology,  may  have 
been  loaned  by  Gautama  to  his  successor  in 
the  path  of  reform,  but  little  else  must  of 
necessity  be  ascribed,  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus, 
to  any  influence  outside  His  own  racial  inherit- 
ance of  sentiment  or  dogma. 

In  the  underlying  philosophy  of  the  Master's 
system,  as  also  in  the  hopefulness  of  His  spirit, 
His  teaching  was  separated  from  Buddhism 
by  the  whole  diameter  of  religious  thought. 

Beyond  the  idea  of  a  holy  life,  with  its  paths 


164    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

of  Awakening,  Conversion,  and  Sanctification, 
there  is  indeed  nothing  whatever  in  common 
between  the  essentials  of  the  two  faiths.  In  es- 
sential Christianity,  as  presented  by  Jesus,  the 
pessimism  of  the  system  of  Buddha  is  sharply 
antagonized.  Human  existence  is  not  an  evil  to 
be  extinguished,  but  something  to  be  exalted, 
no  doubt  corrupt  but  to  be  purified.  There  is 
in  human  nature  a  germ  of  evil,  but  this  can 
by  Divine  aid  be  eradicated.  Virtue  comes  to 
a  cross  but  by  the  grace  of  God ;  this  cross  may 
be  converted  into  the  throne  of  sacrifice  in  this 
world  and  into  a  crown  of  glory  in  the  world 
to  come.  Both  systems  have  a  life  theory  and 
a  life  practise,  but  while  the  dogma  of  the  one 
is  despair  and  of  the  other  hope,  the  practise 
of  the  one  ends  in  personal  extinction  and  of 
the  other  is  personality  glorified.  The  best 
outcome  of  Gautama's  teachings  has  been— 
to  say  nothing  of  the  excrescences  on  the  sur- 
face which  superstition  and  folly  have  added, 
and  which  ought  not  to  be  charged  against 
Gautama  and  his  school — the  monastery,  the 
begging  monk,  the  yellow  gown,  the  shaven 


JESUS  A  DISCIPLE  OF  GAUTAMA?     165 

head,  and  the  wooden  bowl — the  destruction 
of  human  hopefulness,  the  encouragement  of 
mendicancy,  and  war  upon  society.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  outcome  of  the  teaching  of 
Jesus — also  lopping  off  excrescences  of  medie- 
val folly  and  scholastic  dogmatism — has  been, 
a  believer  in  the  world  but  not  of  it,  enjoying 
life  but  not  intoxicated  by  it,  living  in  wedlock 
yet  quite  as  pure  as  the  oriental  celibate,  serv- 
ing the  world  and  urging  on  progress.  The 
logical  result  of  the  Buddhist  teaching  is  the 
extinction  of  the  race  here,  and  the  extinction 
of  personality  hereafter;  the  logical  result  of 
primitive  Christianity  is  the  supremacy  of  an 
altruistic  civilization.  Buddhism  could  only 
have  succeeded  and  does  now  only  survive 
among  a  poor  and  want-harassed  populace. 
It  was  the  religion  of  extremest  poverty,  mis- 
ery, patience — pure,  gentle,  uncomplaining, 
but  suffering.  It  flourished  in  lands  where 
the  few  satiated  themselves  into  disgust  by 
their  profligacy,  while  the  many  sweated  and 
groaned  and  died  under  the  lash  of  tyranny, 
and  the  yet  more  galling  scourge  of  want; 


166    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

where  man-eating  tigers  and  venomous  rep- 
tiles lurked  in  the  jungles,  where  starvation 
often  ran  riot  in  the  street,  and  pestilence 
lurked  in  the  hut.  The  Message  of  Jesus 
has  brought  blessing  everywhither,  providing 
a  tonic  for  wretchedness  and  an  antidote  for 
sin,  disseminating  principles  sure  ultimately  to 
prove  fatal  to  social  ills;  and  it  has  won  the 
Occidental  as  readily  as  the  Oriental,  thrives 
robustly  under  a  black  skin  as  in  the  soul  of 
a  Caucasian  or  Semite,  and  recks  not  of  lati- 
tude, clime,  nor  race. 

Persecution  has  only  purified  and  strength- 
ened the  hold  of  the  religion  of  Jesus;  but,  in 
the  eighth  and  ninth  centuries  of  our  era,  Bud- 
dhism was  effectively  stamped  out  in  India,  its 
stronghold,  by  a  rival  faith. 


PART  FOURTH 

THE  MASTER'S  METHOD  AND 
PERSONALITY 


» 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS 

T>ELIGIOUS  geniuses,  who  perceive  new 
truth  in  the  spiritual  realm,  and  would 
lay  foundation  for  a  new  faith,  contend  with 
several  very  serious  difficulties. 

First,  words  fail  them.  They  find  the 
vernacular  uttering  only  daily  needs,  custom- 
ary ideas,  and  wonted  forms  of  thought.  To 
clothe  the  new  ideas  the  seer  must  either 
fashion  new  words  or  use  old  terms  in  new 
bearings.  In  both  cases  he  is  compelled  to 
speak  suggestively,  handling  language  with 
violence  and  appealing  to  the  imagination. 

Moreover,  the  mental  obtuseness  of  the 
average  man  proves  a  formidable  obstacle. 
The  more  some  common  word  is  made  to 
quiver  with  fresh  life,  the  less  likely  is  it,  with 
this  novel  significance,  to  be  understood. 
Popular  intelligence,  like  popular  language, 


170    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

has  to  be  laboriously  leveled  up  to  the  seer's 
plane  of  thinking.  Imagination  must  be  not 
only  appealed  to,  but  educated. 

In  the  wake  of  stupidity  comes  prejudice. 
The  fool  joins  hands  with  the  boor,  and,  mis- 
understanding, misrepresents ;  and,  very  likely 
alarmed  for  time-honored  institutions  and 
cherished  beliefs,  he  assails.  Hence,  all  re- 
ligious founders  proceeding  on  the  principle 
that  "Many  are  called,  and  few  are  chosen," 
or,  in  other  words,  that  there  needs  must  be 
many  novices  to  few  initiated,  or  as  Socrates 
put  it  long  before  Jesus  uttered  this  proverb, 
"Many  are  the  wand-bearers  and  few  are  the 
mystics,"  have  gathered  groups  of  chosen 
disciples  and  trained  them  to  educate  the 
world. 

Perhaps  the  most  formidable  of  all  the 
obstacles  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  matters  to 
be  treated  of  by  religious  genius  lie,  in  part, 
beyond  the  possibilities  of  any  language,  how- 
ever elaborated,  and,  in  part,  beyond  the  full 
comprehension  of  any  mind,  however  intel- 
ligent. Incapable  of  scientific  measurement 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  171 

and  usual  analysis,  appealing  to  religious  con- 
sciousness rather  than  to  logic,  they  forever  in- 
cite interrogation  and  stir  wonder.  The  words 
reel  and  often  fall  under  their  load.  Religious 
founders  are,  perforce,  seers  of  visions  that 
dazzle  most  of  all  themselves — prophets  in 
whom  the  Spirit  seethes  and  effervesces,  at 
times  almost  unintelligibly,  men  of  awe  who 
occasionally  wax  faint  in  the  effort  to  think 
so  hard,  and  who  often  speak  in  riddles  that 
none  but  they,  and  often  scarcely  they,  can 
solve. 

Jesus  encountered  all  these  difficulties  in 
largest  measure,  His  message  transcending 
the  possibilities  of  exact  definition  and  even 
of  full  intellectual  comprehension.  Whatever 
might  have  been  His  natural  temperament  and 
usual  utterance,  no  course  could  have  been 
open  to  Him  but  to  speak  suggestively,  using 
low  words  in  high  meanings,  and  pictures  in- 
stead of  essays.  He,  too,  must  educate  spir- 
ituality and  reach  the  world  through  disciples. 
He,  too,  possessed  of  great  awe,  must  appeal 
to  spirituality,  forever  challenging  souls  to 


172    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

muse,  barken,  and  understand.  The  urgent 
necessities  of  the  case  required  that  His  dis- 
course should  be  pictorial,  mystical,  and 
autocratic. 

But,  if  such  a  method  had  not  been  in- 
volved in  the  character  of  His  mission,  there 
is  reason  to  conclude  that  Jesus  of  Nazareth 
would  have  chosen  it  of  preference,  and  it  is 
using  moderate  language  to  assert  that  in  His 
case  racial  and  personal  predilection  fitted 
Him  particularly  to  adapt  Himself  to  the 
limitations  of  the  situation.  He  was,  by 
nature,  education,  and  surroundings,  an  Orien- 
tal, His  thinking  fervid,  His  bent  mystical, 
His  imagination  ever  on  fire.  Moreover,  He 
was  a  Hebrew  sharing  fully  in  the  prophetic 
temperament  of  His  race,  which,  though 
feeble  in  analytical  and  logical  power,  de- 
lighted in  action  and  felt  intensely,  pondered 
mystery,  and  gazed  curiously  into  the  unseen. 
Moreover,  His  personal  aptness  of  thought 
and  speech  lent  itself  readily  to  suggestive 
instruction.  His  resources  of  mother  wit  were 
inexhaustible,  His  imagination  was  fertile  and 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  173 

vivid.  Of  education,  in  the  modern  sense,  He 
had  enjoyed  none.  That  He  ever  was  taught, 
in  boyhood  and  youth,  to  scan,  classify,  and 
rate  the  operations  of  cognition,  or  much  less, 
that  He  ever  subjected  His  mental  powers  to 
any  process  of  self-training,  there  is  no  evi- 
dence and  no  likelihood.  Logic,  physics, 
metaphysics,  and  all  similar  realms  of  thought, 
familiar  at  times  to  Greek  scholars,  were  un- 
touched by  Him.  In  the  just  previous  chapter 
we  have  suggested  the  bare  possibility  that 
Jesus  may  have  encountered  one  or  more  In- 
dian seers,  sojourning  in  Palestine  in  His  day, 
and  may  have  received  some  oral  instruction 
in  the  wisdom  of  the  East,  but  of  ordinary 
schooling,  even  as  then  known,  surely  He  had 
been  deprived. 

But  on  this  very  account  the  thinking  of  the 
Master  was  the  more  spontaneous  and  crea- 
tive. It  required  no  study  in  Ars  Poetica  to, 
make  a  Homer,  nor  is  it  presumptuous  to 
doubt  whether  a  Homer  could  have  arisen  in 
the  age  and  surroundings  of  a  Horace.  Mind 
of  the  highest  order  owes  little,  in  its  creative 


174    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

work,  to  the  technicalities  of  the  schools. 
Pedagogical  training  develops  and  organizes 
the  latent  intelligence  of  a  community,  but  it 
represses  individuality  and  clips  the  wings  of 
genius,  producing  scholars  no  doubt,  but  not 
giving  scope  of  vision  to  seers.  The  individu- 
ality of  Jesus  suffered  no  torsion,  and  His 
genius  matured  normally.  The  school  in 
which  He  fitted  Himself  for  His  future  was  the 
village  street,  the  gate,  the  well,  the  synagogue, 
and  the  mountain-top.  His  education  was 
achieved  in  study  of  human  nature  and  in  rapt 
communion  with  God.  Long  fasts,  nights 
spent  under  the  stars  in  the  open,  in  prayer, 
which  at  times  was  ecstatic,  and  a  ministry 
whose  brief  duration  was  uninterrupted  by 
labor  or  even  distracting  thought  upon  the 
exigencies  of  self-support  and  the  mainte- 
nance of  a  family,  afforded  full  scope  for  the 
unfoldings  of  a  nature  of  extraordinary  origi- 
nality, consecrated  to  the  utterance  of  an 
absolute  faith. 

Hence,  when  Jesus  came  to  speak  in  public, 
most  naturally,  and  without  violence  to  His 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  175 

own  habit  of  thought,  He  took  to  indirection, 
not  only  of  necessity  but  with  delight.  His 
utterance  was  a  constant  appeal  to  spirituality. 
It  was  not  precisely  a  case  of  exoteric  and 
esoteric  instruction;  and  yet  there  was  a  re- 
semblance to  those  ancient  systems  of  hidden 
teachings  called  mysteries — of  Eleusis,  of  Bac- 
chus, or  Isis — which  prevailed  in  Egypt,  Cy- 
prus, Syria,  Asia  Minor,  and  Greece.  "To 
you,"  He  said  significantly  to  His  disciples, 
"it  is  given  to  know  the  mysteries  of  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven." 

It  is  of  interest  here  to  note  that  Paul  occu- 
pied precisely  the  same  point  of  view,  declar- 
ing, "Great  is  the  mystery  of  godliness." 
To  Paul,  the  gospel  was  "the  mystery  of  the 
faith,"  "the  mystery  of  God,"  "the  mystery 
which,  from  the  beginning  of  the  world,  hath 
been  hid  in  God,"  and  himself  and  others 
were  "stewards  of  the  mystery  of  God." 

If  we  would  appreciate  the  Master's  dis- 
course, then,  we  must  disengage  from  the 
problem  all  modern  and  occidental  ideas  asso- 
ciated with  public  address.  To  secure  a  hall, 


176    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

to  advertise  for  an  audience,  to  provide  gifted 
secondary  speakers,  to  assemble  a  chorus  of 
beautiful  and  gifted  young  men  and  women 
to  sing  sentimental  hymns  and  tunes,  to  reason 
by  syllogisms,  to  infer  general  laws  from  a 
multitude  of  facts  cited,  to  array  about  a 
favorite  position  a  bulwark  of  texts — all  this 
was  utterly  foreign  to  His  spirit  and  method. 
Doubtless  on  several  occasions,  notably  in 
His  Sermon  on  the  Mount  and  in  the  discourse 
at  Capernaum,  there  lingers  about  the  narra- 
tive some  faint  suggestion  of  premeditated 
public  address;  but  these  orations,  in  sub- 
stance, quality,  and  method,  remove  themselves 
very  far  from  all  the  well-known  types  of  pub- 
lic speech — from  the  golden-mouthed  homily 
of  a  Chrysostom,  from  the  pulpit  thunder- 
ing of  a  Luther,  or  the  homely  Bible  talk  of 
a  Moody.  If  we  must  deem  them  set  dis- 
courses, at  least,  like  all  His  other  sayings, 
they  were  absolutely  original  and  inimitable, 
the  outburst  of  pure  genius  borrowing  nothing. 
With  these  exceptions,  if,  indeed,  they  be 
such,  the  discourses  of  Jesus  were  occasional, 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  177 

His  texts  gathered  by  the  way,  His  subject- 
matter  extempore  and  pertinent,  His  rhetorical 
method  ultra  tropical,  His  spirit  autocratic, 
and  His  sole  motive  benevolence.  He  preached 
anywhere  and  everywhere,  at  any  time  and  at 
all  times,  as  He  was  feasted,  as  He  strolled, 
even  as  He  went  out  to  die,  on  the  mountain- 
top,  in  the  plain,  along  the  village  street  or 
the  country  road,  in  palace  or  hovel,  ashore 
or  afloat.  And  often  He  preached  most  and 
best  by  never  saying  a  word,  but  by  making 
deed  of  mercy  or  significant  occasion  voice 
His  thought.  Modern  sermonizers  get  their 
themes  from  a  written  book;  Jesus  went  to 
Nature  and  to  life. 

His  texts  were  any  picturesque  or  striking 
occurrence — a  gang  of  slaves  going  out  to 
work,  a  woman  of  the  town  weeping  penitent 
at  His  feet,  a  recent  massacre  of  Galileans  by 
Pilate,  a  little  child,  a  draught  of  fishes,  a 
greedy  heir,  a  squall  of  wind,  an  ancient  well, 
spring  lilies,  or  a  grain-field. 

His  rhetorical  method  was  thus  very  pic- 
torial. He  could  be  direct  and  sententious 
12 


178    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

enough  on  occasion,  as,  letting  fall  a  glance  of 
love  and  power  upon  some  busy  man,  He  would 
say  to  some  one  He  had  chosen,  " Follow  Me!" 
or  to  some  one  He  had  purposed  to  heal, 
"Be  thou  clean!"  But  He  preferred  indirec- 
tion, even  where  the  situation  did  not  impera- 
tively demand  it,  and  He  always  seemed 
reluctant  to  call  things  by  what,  in  common 
parlance,  were  their  proper  names.  He  would 
not,  and  from  temperament  could  not,  easily 
"call  a  spade  a  spade." 

Of  the  death  (or  trance)  of  Lazarus,  He  said 
simply,  "  Our  friend  Lazarus  sleepeth ! "  Mark 
put  it  none  too  strong  when  he  wrote  of  the 
Master,  "Without  a  parable,  spake  He  not 
unto  them."  Metaphor,  simile,  contrast,  hy- 
perbole, irony,  sarcasm,  enigma,  and  fictitious 
narrative,  were  the  common  vehicles  of  His 
thought.  The  listener  always  had  occasion  to 
puzzle  out  the  full  bearing  of  the  discourse. 

Take  the  parable  of  the  Unjust  Judge.  In 
this  odious  picture  the  injustice  of  the  magis- 
trate, the  insignificance  of  the  petitioner,  the 
selfishness  of  her  plea,  and  the  success  of  her 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  179 

impudent  teasing,  all  combine  to  furnish 
material  not  for  a  comparison  but  for  a  vivid 
contrast.  Far  from  comparing  this  case  with 
the  answer  to  devout  prayer,  rather  the  Mas- 
ter contrasted  the  two  in  every  particular. 
His  own  summing  up  of  the  situation  substan- 
tially was,  "If  a  person  without  influence,  and 
coming  with  a  bad  plea  to  a  corrupt  court,  can 
get  an  unjust  judge,  who  neither  fears  God  nor 
regards  the  rights  of  man,  by  her  mere  impor- 
tunity to  grant  an  inhuman  demand,  HOW 
MUCH  MORE  will  God,  the  righteous  Judge  of 
all  the  earth,  listen  to  the  holiest  yearnings  of 
His  own  chosen,  who,  so  far  from  insolently 
teasing  Him,  await  His  response  in  simple- 
hearted  and  calm  faith."  But  to  interpret  this 
picture  lesson  evidently  needed  some  alertness 
of  imagination  and  some  touch  of  spirituality. 
Hence  the  irony  of  Jesus  in  condemnation 
of  the  stupidity  of  His  hearers,  who  often 
lacked  this  alertness  and  spirituality.  'This 
people's  heart  is  waxed  gross,  and  their  ears  are 
dull  of  hearing,  and  their  eyes  they  have  closed, 
LEST  at  any  time  they  should  see  with  their 


180    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

eyes  and  hear  with  their  ears  and  understand 
with  their  hearts  and  should  be  converted,  and 
I  should  heal  them!" 

Often  the  situation  became  dramatic,  as 
when  the  five  thousand  were  fed,  the  traders 
were  driven  out  of  the  Temple,  or  the  disciples' 
feet  were  washed. 

In  this  connection  it  is  significant  that  He 
is  reported  to  have  said  to  Saul,  in  the  vision  on 
the  way  to  Damascus,  not "  Saul,  thou  art  fight- 
ing against  God,"  or  similar  direct  rebuke,  but 
"It  is  hard  for  thee  to  kick  against  the  goads." 

In  previous  chapters  we  have  called  atten- 
tion to  the  fact  that  among  all  the  sayings 
of  Jesus  there  are  no  scientifically  expressed 
dogmas.  The  most  important  truths  of  the 
faith  are  entrusted  to  imagery.  The  suprem- 
acy of  righteousness  in  the  heart  is  "the  Heav- 
enly Kingdom,"  virtue  is  "JSonian  Life,"  to 
become  a  Citizen  of  the  Kingdom,  on  the  hu- 
man side  is  "to  change  purpose,"  and  on  the 
divine  side  "to  be  born  again;"  Heaven  is 
"Abraham's  Bosom,"  "the  Garden"  (Para- 
dise) or  "My  Father's  House,"  hell  is  the 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  181 

"refuse  heap,"  or  "the  crematory"  (Ge- 
henna). 

The  reasoning  involved  in  discourses  so 
pictorial  and  suggestive  must  have  varied 
much  from  the  close  logic  of  modern  theo- 
ogical  treatises.  Indeed,  the  dialectic  of  Jesus 
was  a  successive  discharge  of  thunderbolts. 

Such  a  method  was  necessarily  autocratic, 
and,  notwithstanding  His  humility,  sympathy, 
and  charity,  Jesus  was  never  less  than  im- 
perative. He  spoke  as  a  seer  who  did  not 
argue  so  much  as  describe,  as  though  He  were 
a  divine  ambassador  who  announced  and 
proclaimed,  as  though  He  were  typical  Man 
uttering  essential  humanity.  Elijah  was  the 
greatest  of  the  old-time  prophets,  yet  Jesus 
deemed  that  great  man  only  His  own  fore- 
runner. Moses  spake  very  wisely,  but  Jesus 
held  that  His  own  "I  say  unto  you"  was  more 
authoritative  than  the  most  sacred  "It  is  writ- 
ten." Indeed,  this  preaching  of  the  Master 
was  simply  heralding,  and  it  is  so  called  in  the 
narrative.  All  who  listened  observed  at  once 
that  He  spake  not  as  the  scribes,  but  as  one 


182    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

"  having  authority."  His  " follow  me  "  brooked 
no  argument,  and  His  "Verily,  verily,  I  say 
unto  you!"  began  and  closed  the  discussion. 
Whether  in  the  synagogue,  amid  bigots  "filled 
with  madness,"  or  whether  in  Temple  porch 
He  hurled  against  the  corrupt  ring  of  Phari- 
sees, who  controlled  things  in  Jerusalem,  right- 
eous denunciation,  Jesus  was  never  less  than  a 
voice  of  dignity  and  authority. 

Notice  how  in  this  regard  He  differed  from 
another  great  peripatetic  who  strolled  among 
men  and  ever  engaged  them  in  conversation. 
It  was  true  of  the  Master,  as  of  Socrates,  that 
an  irresistible  impulse  compelled  Him  to  talk 
with  every  human  being  He  met;  but,  while 
the  Grecian  philosopher  began  by  always  pre- 
tending to  be  ignorant,  dull,  and  no  stickler 
for  virtue,  soon  by  courteous,  wily,  and  stra- 
tegic argument  to  prove  himself  a  gentleman, 
a  sage,  a  moralist,  and  the  greatest  of  logi- 
cians, Jesus,  contemptuous  of  the  insincerities 
of  courtly  speech  and  untrained  in  the  tech- 
nicalities of  scholastic  reasoning,  directly 
searched  the  spirit  and  spoke  to  the  heart. 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  183 

He  would  always  reply  with  not  what  the 
remark  addressed  to  Him  seemed  to  require, 
but  what  the  spiritual  situation  seemed  to 
demand.  This  involved  surprise  and  often 
the  appearance  of  abruptness.  Thus,  when 
asked,  "Lord,  are  there  few  that  be  saved?" 
the  reply  was  not  affirmation,  denial,  nor  ex- 
planation, but  only,  "Strive  thou  to  enter 
in  at  the  Strait  Gate!"  On  one  occasion 
there  came  to  Him  a  man,  probably  of  a 
light,  inflammable  nature,  who  said  breath- 
lessly, "Lord,  I  will  follow  Thee  whitherso- 
ever Thou  goest!"  and,  instead  of  drawing 
rapturously  to  His  bosom  so  promising  a 
convert,  the  Master,  calm  and  cool,  mentioned 
only  the  cost  of  the  sacrifice — "Foxes  have 
holes,  and  birds  of  the  air  have  nests,  but  the 
Son  of  Man  hath  not  where  to  lay  His  head!" 
At  another  time,  now  evidently  dealing  with 
a  disciple  convicted  and  well  informed  but 
reluctant,  Jesus  said,  "Follow  me!"  and  when 
the  man  began  to  make  excuse,  pleading  that 
he  must  first  go  and  bury  his  dead  father,  the 
Master  evinced  His  own  sense  of  the  pre- 


184    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

potence  of  a  clear  call  of  duty  over  all  forms 
and  proprieties,  urged  frivolously,  in  the  tre- 
mendous reply,  "Let  the  dead  bury  their 
dead,  but  GO  THOU  AND  PREACH  THE  KING- 
DOM OF  GOD!" 

Still  another,  doubtless  a  plausible  person, 
pretentious  and  insincere,  time-serving  and 
untrustworthy,  already  long  since  committed 
to  the  cause,  courteously  evaded  present  obli- 
gation with  the  plea,  "Lord,  I  will  follow 
Thee,  but  let  me  first  go  bid  them  farewell, 
which  are  at  home,  at  my  house,"  only  to 
receive  the  stern  rebuke,  "No  man,  having 
put  his  hand  to  the  plow  and  looking  back,  is 
fit  for  the  Kingdom  of  God."  These  replies, 
so  common  in  the  Gospel  narratives,  are  very 
darts — whither  they  were  aimed  they  struck, 
and  where  they  struck  they  pierced.  To  bor- 
row an  old  Latin  definition  of  a  good  epigram, 
they  were  like  bees,  "small,  sweet,  and  with 
a  sting  in  the  tail."  Inbreathed  of  the  soul 
of  wit,  they  were  utterly  surprising,  not  to  be 
escaped,  and  not  to  be  forgotten. 

A  sound  exegesis  of  the  Master's  sayings 


THE  RHETORIC  OF  JESUS  185 

ought  thus  to  involve  far  more  than  gram- 
matical training  and  intellectual  vigor.  There 
is  needed  in  the  student  of  Jesus  now  as  in  His 
disciples  of  old,  alertness,  interrogation,  rev- 
erence, faith,  and,  above  all,  spirituality  of 
understanding.  To  grasp  the  logia  of  Jesus 
in  a  dogmatic  fist  is  to  utterly  crush  them; 
one's  touch  must  be  as  light  as  the  brushing 
of  an  angel's  wing.  Well  for  the  exegete  if 
he  love  wit,  well  if  his  imagination  be  respon- 
sive, well  if  his  thinking  be  shot  through,  here 
and  there,  with  a  golden  thread  of  poetry. 

We  may  learn  a  profitable  lesson  from  the 
obtuseness  of  the  disciples,  who,  though  Orien- 
tals themselves  and  under  their  Lord's  constant 
training,  were  always  misunderstanding  Him, 
murmuring  aside  in  little  groups  of  puzzled 
unbelief  and  discontent.  Again  and  again 
the  Master  found  Himself  sighing,  "How  is  it 
that  ye  have  no  faith?"  "Oh,  faithless  and 
perverse  generation!"  "How  is  it,  that  ye 
do  not  understand?"  Yet  those  dull  follow- 
ers were  very  mystics  alongside  of  many  a 
commentator  or  theologian  who  has  planted 


186    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

elephantine  foot  upon  the  delicate  play  of  the 
Prophet's  irony  and  the  ethereal  subtleties  of 
His  imagination  and  spirituality.  Well  said 
Voltaire  of  Dante,  "He,  too,  has  commenta- 
tors, which  is  another  reason  why  he  is  not 
understood!" 


CHAPTER  XVI 

SOME  PERSONAL  CHARACTERISTICS 
OF  JESUS 


Master  discerned  the  unseen.     He  saw 
beyond.     It  was  not  second  sight  but 
first  sight  —  seeing  through  and  through. 

The  spiritual  world,  like  the  scientific,  is 
boundless.  We  know  that  scientists  are  for- 
ever pushing  out  the  barriers  only  to  find  the 
same  infinity  of  the  unknown  beyond.  In  the 
glory  of  the  heavens  the  naked  eye  can  dis- 
cern a  vast  number  of  planets  and  stars,  which 
telescopes  multiply  a  thousandfold  and  the 
imagination  a  millionfold;  and  in  the  realm 
of  the  minute,  our  microscopes  show  a  like 
expanding  multiplicity  of  the  small,  so  that 
into  a  thimble  you  may  crowd  thousands  of 
billions  of  microbes,  each  a  perfect  cell  carry- 
ing the  whole  mystery  of  life,  and  each  possi- 

187 


188    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

bly  a  universe  in  complexity.     To  the  infinite 
and  to  the  infinitesimal  there  is  no  limit. 

And,  in  morals  and  religion,  no  more  are 
there  barriers  beyond  which  thought  may  not 
penetrate.  There  is  always  a  beyond  and  a 
beyond.  It  is  with  religion  as  it  is  with  every- 
thing else :  to  see  one  must  look,  and  when  one 
looks  more  looms  up  in  the  background  for 
future  acquirement.  The  beautiful  sunset  is 
for  all  the  town,  but  not  one  eye  in  a  hundred 
sends  his  loving  glance  to  behold  and  enjoy  its 
pageant  of  ruby  and  emerald,  amethyst  and 
gold;  and  even  the  nature-lover,  who  gazes, 
perceives  more  than  color  and  form,  more  than 
sunshine  and  cloud — perceives  sunset  of  splen- 
dor for  life's  evening,  a  Golden  Age  for  the 
world's  future,  Nature's  beckoning  to  dream- 
land and  reverie.  And,  just  so,  the  starlit 
heavens  glow  for  a  hemisphere,  but  few  gaze 
up  to  pierce  their  mystery  and  muse  upon  the 
glories  of  an  endless  universe ;  and  such  as  can 
do  this,  go  farther,  and  discern  those  heavens 
which  be  above  the  skies.  Every  pool  teems 
with  life,  but  how  many  have  actually  looked 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         189 

through  microscopes  upon  that  fairy  world  of 
existence  and  minute  beauty;  and  the  few 
that  are  inquiring  and  patient  enough  for  this 
are  those  who  look  deep  into  the  laws  under- 
lying life  and  the  evolution  of  things  hidden 
from  others.  They  see  who  look,  and  whoso 
behold  with  eyes  of  flesh  find  eyes  of  imagina- 
tion also  working  in  them,  and  visions  of 
spirituality  forming  in  the  field  of  sight.  To 
see  is  the  beginning  of  all  spirituality,  it  is 
God's  school  of  growth  in  divine  wisdom. 
Said  Ruskin,  "Hundreds  of  people  can  talk 
for  one  who  can  think,  but  thousands  can 
think  for  one  who  can  see.  To  see  clearly  is 
poetry,  prophecy,  and  religion  all  in  one." 

More,  probably,  than  any  one  who  ever 
lived  Jesus  saw  into  and  through  and  behind 
things,  in  the  sphere  of  ethics  and  religion. 
You  may  say  of  Him  what  Goethe  declared 
of  Plato:  "He  sought  Heaven  like  a  pointed 
flame!" 

It  was  this  gift  kept  Him  undeceived  and 
disillusioned  as  to  the  shallow  formalism  of 
the  Pharisees,  the  elegant  unbelief  of  the 


190    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

Sadducees,  the  narrow  pietism  of  the  Essenes, 
and  the  gilded  coarseness  of  the  Herodians. 
The  great  rabbis  to  Him  were  only  subtle 
casuists,  the  Sabbath  was  an  institution  or- 
dained for  the  benefit  of  man,  ceremonies  were 
but  conveniences  for  the  formation  of  useful 
habits  of  devotion,  long  prayers  a  senseless 
chatter,  religious  parade  an  abomination. 
Even  the  Temple  was  but  perishable  stone- 
work of  human  device,  and  not  in  the  least 
essentially  sacred.  Remember  how  He 
scorned  the  superstition,  which  in  inherited 
affliction  discerned  an  ancestral  curse  of  God; 
and  how  He  rejected  the  false  patriotism 
which  viewed  foreigners  as  the  enemies  of 
God,  and  how  He  claimed  heretical  Samari- 
tans as  His  brethren.  Did  He  not  remind 
His  neighbors  at  Nazareth  that  Elijah,  during 
a  famine,  had  been  sent  not  to  a  Hebrew  but 
to  a  Sidonian  woman,  and  that  Elisha  had 
cleansed  no  leper  but  Naaman  the  Syrian? 
He  commended  the  faith  of  a  Roman  cen- 
turion, and  in  the  same  breath  upbraided  the 
Jews  for  their  unbelief.  When  James  and 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         191 

John,  those  sons  of  thunder,  would,  in  their 
fiery  zeal,  command  flame  to  come  from 
Heaven  and  consume  an  inhospitable  Sama- 
ritan village,  "even  as  Elias  did,"  He  replied, 

'Ye  know  not  what  manner  of  spirit  ye  are 
of,  for  the  Son  of  Man  is  not  come  to  destroy 
men's  lives  but  to  save  them."     The  hero  of 
one  of  His  parables  was  a  Samaritan,  aye,  and 
— Shade  of  Hillel — a  good  Samaritan !  while  the 
villains  of  the  story  were  a  priest  and  a  levite! 
For  Him,  many  rich  were  poor  and  some 
poor  rich;  there  were  last  who  should  be  first 
and  first  who,  by  and  by,  should  find  them- 
selves last;    there  were  many  called  and  few 
chosen,  many  novices  and  few  mystics;    the 
wise  might  be  cast  out  and  babes  had  become 
the  proper  types  for  wisdom;    the  Pharisee 
in  the  Temple  remained  unheard,  while  the 
publican  who  dared  not  lift  up  his  eyes  went 
away  justified;   the  poor  widow  dropping  but 
two  mites  into  the  treasury,  gave  more  than 
wealthy  nobles  who  deposited  gold;  the  Chil- 
dren of  the  Kingdom  should  go  into  outer  dark- 
ness and  disciples  should  come  from  the  east 


192    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

and  west,  north  and  south,  to  take  their  place 
with  the  old  patriarchs. 

For  Jesus,  the  slave  might  seem  as  worthy 
of  respect  as  the  emperor,  the  layman  as  the 
priest;  and  another  world  of  judgment  might 
place  Dives  in  torment  and  Lazarus,  the 
beggar,  on  Abraham's  bosom.  He  denounced 
the  world  for  its  follies,  its  shams,  its  vices,  and 
its  crimes,  and,  although  He  showed  Himself 
possessed  of  the  very  largest  faith  in  the  possi- 
bilities of  human  reform,  He  never  closed  His 
eyes  to  existing  evils.  A  very  child  of  the 
Devil,  at  the  eleventh  hour,  might  repent  and 
be  received.  His  own  humble,  ignorant,  and 
often  dull  peasant  apostles  seemed  to  Him 
princes  in  prospect.  He  saw  their  thrones, 
their  crowns,  their  dominions,  in  the  future. 
Nay,  any  poor  drudge,  wearing  the  yoke, 
labor  as  he  must,  be  weary  as  he  might,  and 
afflicted  beyond  measure,  in  Him  and  in  God 
should  find  rest. 

When  John  and  others  came  to  Him  with 
the  complaint,  "Master,  we  saw  one  casting 
out  devils  in  Thy  name  and  he  f olloweth  not 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         193 

us,  and  we  forbade  him  because  he  followeth 
not  us,"  the  reply  was  grave:  "Forbid  him 
not,  for  there  is  no  man  which  shall  do  a 
miracle  in  my  Name  that  can  speak  evil  of 
me.  For  he  that  is  not  against  us  is  on  our 
part.  For  whosoever  shall  give  a  cup  of  water 
to  drink  in  my  Name,  because  ye  belong  to 
Christ,  verily  I  say  unto  you  he  shall  not  lose 
his  reward."  And  when  the  Samaritan  wo- 
man, at  Jacob's  well,  attempted  to  argue 
theology,  saying,  "Our  fathers  worshiped  in 
this  mountain,  and  ye  say  that  in  Jerusalem 
is  the  place  where  man  ought  to  worship," 
how  did  He  answer  with  words  of  insight, 
"The  hour  cometh  and  now  is,  when  the  true 
worshipers  shall  worship  the  Father  in  spirit 
and  in  truth." 

This  everywhereness  of  standpoint,  with  its 
turning  of  things  topsy-turvy,  this  range  and 
penetration  of  vision,  naturally  showed  itself 
in  some  distance  between  the  Master  and  His 
disciples — they  not  only  did  not  always  under- 
stand His  utterances,  as  we  remarked  in  the 

last  chapter,  they  sometimes  failed  utterly  to 
13 


194    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

fathom  Himself.  And  at  times,  when  they 
had  persuaded  themselves  that  the  enigma 
had  cleared  up,  they  were  far  from  secure  in 
their  apprehension.  "  Lo !  now  speakest  Thou 
plainly,"  they  assured  Him  on  that  last  night 
in  which  He  was  betrayed;  "now  we  are  sure 
that  Thou  knowest  all  things,  and  needest  not 
that  any  man  should  ask  Thee;  by  this  we 
believe  that  Thou  earnest  forth  from  God," 
only  to  provoke  His  searching  glance  and  His 
sighing  response:  " Do  ye  now  believe ?  Be- 
hold, the  hour  cometh,  yea,  is  now  come,  that 
ye  shall  be  scattered  every  man  to  his  own, 
and  shall  leave  me  alone;  and  yet  I  am  not 
alone,  for  the  Father  is  with  me!" 

Closely  connected  with  this  insight,  and  in 
part  explaining  it,  was  the  Master's  intensity 
of  conviction.  Truth  held  Him  in  a  giant's 
grasp  and  swayed  Him  with  regal  omnipo- 
tence. In  His  hand  seems  to  have  been  an 
IthurieFs  spear,  at  touch  of  which  error,  how- 
ever disguised  in  comely  shape  and  goodly 
raiment,  started  up  in  its  own  detestable  and 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS          195 

grisly  appearance.  Truth  was  truth,  lies 
were  lies,  falsehood  was  abominable,  and  sin- 
cerity divine.  "Beware  of  the  leaven  of  the 
Pharisees,  which  is  hypocrisy,"  He  warned 
His  disciples;  and  the  hypocrisy  in  view  was 
not  conscious  and  deliberate  pretense,  perpe- 
trated with  malice  aforethought,  but  as  the 
Greek  word  means,  "play  acting,"  or  that 
unconscious  posturing  and  parade  which  con- 
cealed insincerity  and  which  at  that  time 
passed  current  for  devotion;  it  was  not  what 
Rochefoucauld  had  in  mind  when  he  defined 
hypocrisy  as  the  "homage  vice  pays  to  virtue," 
nor  what  the  good  Abbe  Poulle  sighed  for, 
during  the  French  Revolution,  when  he  de- 
clared with  a  sigh,  "Alas!  there  are  no  hypo- 
crites now!"  (religion  having  ceased  to  be  an 
available  cloak).  The  hypocrisy  alleged  by 
Jesus  was  simply  the  playing  in  life  of  a  part 
not  one's  own.  Himself  was  intensely  sincere, 
and  for  Him  to  recognize  a  truth  was  to  adopt 
and  proclaim  it  at  any  cost  whatever. 

Doubtless   the   love   of  truth   is   innate  in 
mankind,  one  of  the  sanctities  of  the  inner 


196    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

shrine  of  the  best  humanity.  Even  those  most 
given  to  negation  are  often  jealous  for  facts 
proven.  One  of  the  fiercest  of  modern  skep- 
tics taunts  believers  with  the  inability  to 
conceive  "why  any  man  should  attack  a  lie 
simply  because  it  is  a  lie";  while  Huxley,  in 
the  same  breath  which  asserts  that  man  is  a 
"conscious  automaton,"  pleads  for  a  love  of 
truth,  insisting  on  the  taking  of  his  bitter  pill, 
for  the  truth's  sake.  Though  the  heavens  fall 
through  its  acceptance,  we  must  receive  and 
revere  what  is  true. 

To  Jesus,  this  inborn  sincerity  was  a  notice- 
able characteristic. 

Another  characteristic  was  His  intensity  of 
self-poise.  He  was  not  under  the  stress  of 
multitude.  In  this  He  very  sharply  contrasted 
most  of  His  kind.  The  stress  of  multitude 
conditions  nearly  all  thought  and  action. 

The  orator  shows  this  very  plainly  when  he 
faces  an  audience.  He  may  have  met  these 
same  people,  this  and  that  one  and  the  other, 
on  the  street  with  indifferent  cordiality  or 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS          197 

cold  neglect,  but  let  him  face  them  in  a  hall 
and  his  carelessness  is  gone;  the  assemblage, 
as  a  whole,  is  larger,  wiser,  more  to  be  feared, 
more  to  be  courted,  than  each  or  any  of  them 
considered  alone,  or  all  of  them  on  the  average. 
This  collective  person,  these  many  in  the 
dignity  of  multitude,  exact  and  receive  from 
him  an  homage  which,  as  persons  individual, 
they  do  not  ask  nor  deserve. 

Soldiers  keenly  feel  this  power  of  the  many 
in  unit;  in  consequence,  Providence  has  ever 
been  on  the  side  of  heavy  battalions.  Many 
of  the  greatest  victories  of  history  have  simply 
been  the  result  of  the  moral  impression  of  mul- 
titude: a  column  of  narrow  front,  but  massive 
in  depth,  would  move  in  phalanx  upon  the 
enemy,  and  though  it  was  evident  that  only 
the  foremost  could  engage  in  battle,  the  foe 
with  wider,  but  on  the  whole  lighter,  column 
would  break  and  fly,  terrified,  and  before  a 
blow  was  struck.  The  Romans  were  invinci- 
ble and  conquered  the  world  because  they 
possessed  the  rare  moral  quality  which  ena- 
bled them  to  resist  in  imagination  the  stress 


198    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

of  multitude  and  to  fight  undismayed  in  thin, 
open  lines.  To-day,  it  is  only  the  army  of  a 
civilized  nation  that  can  battle  in  thin,  open 
lines. 

The  majority  of  men  are  simply  genus 
homo,  at  best  only  average  humanity,  unable 
to  form  judgments  or  to  act,  except  in  crowds. 
As  Madame  Roland,  herself  one  of  the  vic- 
tims of  the  frenzy  of  a  populace,  said,  amid  the 
horrors  of  the  French  Revolution,  "The  feeble 
howl  with  the  wolves,  bray  with  the  asses, 
and  bleat  with  the  sheep!"  Mankind  is  most 
courageous,  most  cruel,  and  most  cowardly  in 
masses. 

Jesus  possessed  in  highest  degree  the  quali- 
ties which  enable  some  to  free  themselves 
from  this  bondage  of  servile  submission  to 
numbers.  He  belonged  to  the  minority  of 
the  minority — aye,  and  He  was  elect  even 
among  the  chosen.  Nothing  of  His  thinking 
was  done  in  the  public  mill.  His  X-ray  was 
not  deflected  by  magnetism,  as  a  physicist 
might  say.  He  confessed  to  none  but  the 
Father.  Indeed,  He  was  most  Himself  when 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS          199 

away  from  men,  alone  with  God — in  the  fields 
strolling,  on  the  mountain  tops  while  others 
slept. 

We  need  not  be  surprised,  then,  when  we 
find  the  Master  doing  unpopular  things.  He 
antagonized  the  Pharisees,  who  in  any  vigor- 
ous assertion  of  Messianic  claims  by  any  one 
would  seem  to  have  been  the  most  easily 
rallied  advisers  and  adherents,  as  they  were 
the  Messianic  party.  He  associated  with  pub- 
licans, though  these  officials  were  detested  by 
all  men.  He  healed  the  sick  on  the  Sabbath 
day,  in  seemingly  needless  offending  of  very 
common  prejudice.  He  ate  with  unwashed 
hands,  contravening  good  manners.  He  re- 
pressed popular  demonstrations  and  drew 
aloof  from  vulgar  crowds,  that  with  gaping 
mouths,  hungry  stomachs,  and  itching  palms 
thronged  and  would  lionize  Him.  He  dis- 
liked publicity,  tumultuous  support,  and  vul- 
gar applause ;  and  even  almost  seemed  to  resent 
endorsement  from  many,  reputed  wise  and 
undeniably  powerful.  "See  that  thou  tell  no 
man!"  was  often  His  anxious  injunction  for 


200    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  healed.  He  not  seldom  avoided  His  own 
followers,  slipped  away,  and  withdrew  into 
privacy.  His  delight  in  the  desert  place  and 
the  mountain  heights  probably  was  in  some 
measure  owing  to  the  fact  that  these  places 
were  inaccessible.  As  He  appealed  only  to 
thoughtfulness  and  spirituality,  unlike  the 
usual  religious  reformer  or  the  professional 
revivalist,  He  exceedingly  dreaded  fanaticism, 
commotion,  and  noisy  approval. 

In  short,  Jesus  was  self-poised,  by  nature 
an  aloof  and  unpopular  man,  the  creator  of 
great  thought  but  not  the  successful  promoter 
of  a  great  movement.  He  Himself  did  little 
toward  the  founding  of  the  Christian  Church 
as  a  historical  movement,  except  to  furnish 
the  underlying  principles;  and  when  Christen- 
dom arose  in  its  might  it  was  largely  through 
the  magnetism  and  energy  of  more  practical 
men,  and  proved  itself  a  structure  only  in  part 
evolved  out  of  His  visions,  ethics,  and  charity. 

Closely  allied  to  these  characteristics  was 
another  very  marked  in  Jesus  and  impossible 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         201 

to  overlook  in  any  even  casual  study  of  His 
career.  This  was  the  perpetual  recurrence  of 
that  Moral  Shock  which  vice  and  crime  always 
cause  in  virtue.  All  innocent  and  upright 
persons  feel  this  in  some  measure,  and  often 
when  young  quite  intensely.  Age  brings  some 
deadening  of  this  sensibility  with  every  one; 
the  best  come  to  listen  to  the  oaths  of  the 
profane  with  increasing  indifference,  read  the 
daily  details  of  vice  and  crime  without  shud- 
der, and  discuss  social  problems  with  calm 
allowance  for  so  much  of  social  obliquity. 

Jesus  was  very  peculiar  in  that  the  horror 
of  wounded  virtue  never  left  His  eyes;  His 
imagination  never  became  reconciled;  His 
heart  never  ceased  to  be  indignant.  The 
petty  hatreds  of  business  competition,  the 
foolish  feuds  of  families,  the  currish  ill-will 
that  can  not  abide  the  prosperity  of  rivals, 
the  snarlings  of  jealousy,  the  gleeful  whisper- 
ings of  elvish  gossip,  the  flatteries  that  cover 
subservient  contempt,  the  slanders  that  utter 
deliberate  spite,  the  guile  that  seeks  the  ends 
of  fraud,  the  violence  that  strikes  for  anger, 


202    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

and  the  treachery  which  accomplishes  the  vile 
designs  of  lust — these,  and  all  similar  out- 
bursts of  the  savage  in  us,  were  ever  in  full 
view  of  the  Master,  His  dread,  His  grief,  His 
deadly  foes.  He  pronounced  the  generation 
in  which  He  lived,  "evil  and  adulterous,"  and 
in  its  presence  He  stood,  like  Moses  at  the  orgy 
of  the  Israelites,  like  Ezekiel  in  the  Temple, 
like  Danijel  at  the  feast  of  Belshazzar,  a  pres- 
ence of  rebuke.  So  He  said  of  the  world, 
"  Me  it  hateth,  because  I  testify  of  it,  that  the 
works  thereof  are  evil!" 

We  have  observed  that  the  shallow  ethics 
of  His  day,  confusing  disaster  with  guilt  and 
interpreting  heredity  as  sin,  did  not  cloud  His 
eagle  vision.  He  even  made  such  popular 
superstitions  texts  for  sermons  of  denunciation 
of  themselves.  When  certain  of  His  disciples 
told  Him  of  the  Galileans  whose  blood  Pilate 
had  mingled  with  their  sacrifices,  He  asked 
them,  "Suppose  ye  that  these  Galileans  were 
sinners  above  all  the  Galileans,  because  they 
suffered  these  things?  -I  tell  you  nay;  but 
except  ye  repent,  ye  shall  all  likewise  per- 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         203 

ish!"  Or  those  eighteen,  upon  whom  the 
tower  in  Siloam  fell  and  slew  them,  think  ye 
that  they  were  sinners  above  all  men  that 
dwell  in  Jerusalem  ?  I  tell  you  nay ;  but  ex- 
cept ye  repent,  ye  shall  all  likewise  perish!" 

A  vivid  scene  illustrates  this  ethical  severity 
of  the  Master.  It  was  after  He  had  healed 
an  impotent  man  on  the  Sabbath  day,  at  the 
Pool  of  Bethesda,  and  was  subsequent  to  a 
plucking  of  grain  by  the  disciples  to  satisfy 
hunger,  also  on  the  holy  day.  The  scribes 
and  Pharisees,  who  were  at  that  time  follow- 
ing the  Prophet's  trail  like  bloodhounds,  lis- 
tening to  His  words  of  grace  with  malice  and 
tempting  Him  with  dangerous  queries,  had 
forced  upon  Him,  in  a  synagogue,  the  vital 
issue  of  Sabbath  desecration.  Oh!  that  only 
He  would  heal  this  cripple,  and  so,  before  all 
the  multitude,  proclaim  Himself  a  violator  of 
law !  The  savage  in  them  had  drawn  the  bow 
and  balanced  the  spear.  Those  cold  faces, 
the  eager  cripple,  and  Jesus  so  sad,  the  shock 
of  virtue  in  His  heart,  such  strange  fire  in  His 
usually  mild  eyes,  and  such  sense  of  conscious 


204    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

power  in  the  poise  of  His  body!     With  what 
quiet  authority  did  He  bid  the  patient  "Stand 
forth!"   and  as  the  man  advanced,   embar- 
rassed, study  the  attitude  of  the  Master  as 
He  fixed  His  gaze,  not  upon  the  man,  but 
upon  the  crowd.     "Is  it  lawful  to  do  good  on 
the  Sabbath  day  or  to  do  evil  ?  to  save  life  or 
to  kill ?"     As  no  answer  came,  He  "was  filled 
with  wrath."     The  word  wrath  is  very  strong 
in    the    Greek.     A    mighty    indignation  had 
possessed  the  Prophet,  and  He  was  like  Elijah 
before    Ahab.     "Stretch    forth    thy    hand!" 
Let  them  go  out  now,  those  small,  venomous 
souls,  and  hiss  their  hatred  to  the  Herodians. 
But  notice  the  contrast  between  His  "wrath" 
and  their  "madness."     He  was  enlarged  by 
His  indignation  and  stood  forth  from  the  scene 
sublime  like  an  archangel,  they  shrivelled  into 
detestable  envy,  jealousy,  and  spite — human 
toads,  wolves,   hyenas.     His  wrath  was  the 
shock  of  virtue,  the  obverse  side  of  His  love, 
and  His  disciples,  after  His  death,  could,  and 
without  the  slightest  feeling  of  contradiction 
in  terms,  proclaim  Him   the   coming   Judge 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS          205 

and  warn  all  of  the  "wrath  of  the  Lamb." 
They  remembered  how  perpetual  in  Him  was 
the  ethical  shock. 

Contrasting  this  perpetual  shock  of  virtue 
in  the  Master  was  a  quite  characteristic  tender- 
ness, which  should  never  be  ignored  or  belittled 
in  any  estimate  of  Him.  We  might  almost 
say  there  was  a  womanly  streak  in  His  nature. 
There  was  in  Him  boundless  capacity  for 
affectionateness  and  sympathy;  He  loved  lit- 
tle children,  took  them  in  His  arms,  blessed 
them,  and  used  them  as  types  of  innocence 
and  faith,  and  He  gathered  about  Him  pure- 
minded  women  in  deathless  friendships.  The 
sufferings  of  men  melted  His  heart.  At  the 
tomb  of  Lazarus  He  wept,  though  Lazarus 
was  about  to  come  forth,  seemingly  in  view 
not  merely  of  this  sorrow  but  also  of  the  dark 
sepulcher  and  of  the  many  Marthas  and 
Marys  who  should  grieve  for  their  lost  un- 
comforted. 

We  have  already  noted  how,  as  He  came 
over  the  Mount  of  Olives  in  His  last  approach 


206    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

to  Jerusalem,  when  the  people  were  waving 
palm-branches  in  token  of  His  future  victory 
and  flinging  down  their  gala  garments  to  be 
trodden  upon  by  Him,  at  that  moment  of  His 
supremest  earthly  triumph,  at  sight  of  the 
Holy  City  and  in  vision  of  its  coming  over- 
throw and  desolation,  He  burst  into  tears. 
A  few  days  later,  as  He  went  out  to  Calvary, 
preceding  His  own  cross  and  with  the  fore- 
shadow of  death  resting  upon  Him,  He  yet 
did  turn  with  pity  toward  the  weeping  women 
who  followed,  thinking  actually  less  of  His 
own  dark  fate  than  of  the  woes  which  must 
come  over  them.  And,  dying  in  agony,  this 
was  His  prayer  over  His  enemies:  "Father, 
forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what  they 
do!" 

Even  love  of  nature  and  delight  in  the 
beautiful  was  not  denied  Him.  He  admired 
flowers  and  mused  over  seeds,  sought  the 
brotherhood  of  the  winds,  played  with  the 
waves,  and  communed  with  the  stars.  The 
eloquent  Hindoo  sage,  Mozoomdar,  in  his 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         207 

"Oriental  Christ,"  does  not  draw  heavily 
upon  his  imagination  when  He  declares  of  the 
Master,  "The  dew  and  the  sunshine,  the 
seed  time  and  the  harvest,  the  fields,  pastures, 
flocks,  and  flowers  were  to  Him  a  perpetual 
festival.  His  eyes  dwelt  and  wandered  in  the 
midst  of  them,  His  ears  drank  their  music, 
His  heart  feasted  upon  their  poetry,  His  im- 
agination extracted  sweet  everlasting  meta- 
phors from  them.  His  spirit  had  the  poetic 
pastoral  genius  of  the  primitive  Hebrew.  He 
spent  His  nights  with  the  stars  upon  the 
mountain  tops,  He  preached  on  the  shingly 
margin  of  the  Galilean  lake,  He  spake  from 
the  ripples  of  its  breezy  surface.  Nature  was 
His  bridal  chamber,  and  Christ  was  the  bride- 
groom." 

It  grieves  us  to  fail  of  evidence  that  Jesus 
was  a  musician  of  some  sort,  or  at  least  that 
He  was  a  lover  of  tone  and  melody.  He  may, 
as  a  boy,  have  listened  with  pleasure  to  the 
murmuring  of  the  leaves  as  they  fluttered  in 
the  winds,  or  to  the  love-calls  and  trills  of 
song-birds,  or  to  the  occasional  lays  of  stroll- 


208    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

ing  musicians,  but  there  is  no  record  of  it. 
In  His  homilies  He  speaks  tenderly  of  spar- 
rows, but  never  draws  any  lesson  from  the 
warblings  of  nightingales.  This  could  njot 
have  been  because  appreciation  of  music  in 
His  day  generally  failed  His  race.  There 
were  many  musical  instruments,  and  their 
chords  and  melodies,  though  simple,  were 
sweet.  From  time  immemorial  strings  had 
been  stretched  so  as  to  vibrate  tones  in  drafts 
of  winds,  and  sometimes  different  tones  in 
harmony.  The  warrior's  bow,  ages  ago,  had 
been  strung  with  catgut,  or  similar  material, 
and  with  more  strings  than  one,  and  bent  into 
a  harp;  the  hollow  reed  had  been  cut  into 
ancestors  to  flutes  and  oboes.  There  were 
now  such  harps  as  David  played,  and  better, 
psalteries,  sackbuts,  and  other  instruments. 
And  musicians  of  some  rude  skill  must  have 
abounded.  Did  Jesus  love  tones?  was  He 
set  dreaming  over  chords  ?  did  He  hum  to 
Himself  melodies  ?  did  He  listen  with  breath 
abated  and  with  eyes  of  rapture  to  the  rude 
minstrelsy  of  the  times  ?  If  so,  it  was  a  fea- 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         209 

ture  of  His  inner  life  and  not  alluded  to  in  His 
public  teachings.  Perhaps  this  silence  is  not 
significant,  and  owing  to  the  fact  that  music 
in  His  day  connected  itself  with  hideous  rites 
of  burial  and  mad  scenes  of  revelry. 

Nor  can  we  show  any  appreciation,  or  even 
consciousness,  of  the  other  fine  arts — of  paint- 
ing, sculpture,  and  architecture  —  in  the 
Prophet  of  Nazareth. 

We  are  certain  of  ourselves  only  when  we 
assert  that  He  loved  the  beautiful  in  nature. 
The  beautiful  in  art  was  either  an  untrodden 
world  or  else,  for  reasons,  ignored  in  public 
address. 

Coming  to  His  relation  to  the  future,  we 
observe  in  Jesus  what  has  appeared  in  the 
visions  of  all  who  foresee — He  could  not  esti- 
mate distance. 

To  those  who  possess  the  wonderful  gift  of 
precognition — and  it  has  been  proven  beyond 
reasonable  denial  that  there  are  some  thus 
strangely  endowed — time  is  not  an  essential 
element  in  the  prophetic  landscape.  Their 

visions  are  not  in  diorama  but  in  panorama, 
14 


210    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

in  scenes  which  succeed  each  other  but  not  in 
perfect  order  or  nice  adjustment  of  sequence. 

Jesus  commissioned  the  Twelve  with  the 
significant  promise,  "Ye  shall  not  have  gone 
over  the  cities  of  Israel,  until  the  Son  of  Man 
be  come!"  And  when  this  failed,  He  assured 
His  own  that  the  generation  in  which  they 
lived  was  not  to  pass  ere  all  should  be  fulfilled. 
And  then  it  was  the  aeon,  which  should  close 
with  the  old  order. 

There  is  something  generous  and  beautiful 
about  this  far-sightedness  of  enthusiasm,  be- 
littling hindrances,  this  eager  outgrasping  for 
tangible  results;  and  it  is  most  touching  to 
hear  each  great-hearted  reformer  cry  out,  in 
ardor  of  hope,  concerning  His  message : 

"If  this  fail,  the  pillared  firmament  is  rottenness, 
And  earth's  base  built  on  stubble!" 

Perhaps  the  prayer  in  Gethsemane  and  the 
cry  of  agony  on  the  cross  indicate  in  the  Mas- 
ter something  of  that  disappointment  which 
always  befalls  prophet  and  reformer  as  there 
conies  gradually  perception  of  God's  delays 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         211 

and  virtue's  failures.  Be  that  as  it  may,  His 
visions  were  not  false,  because  retreating  ever 
into  the  remote  future;  and  His  ideas  were 
not  less  noble  for  being  from  any  and  every 
human  point  of  view  impracticable.  Things 
absurd  to  men  may,  after  all,  be  practicable  to 
God,  but  only  at  His  time  and  in  His  way. 
The  mills  of  the  gods  grind  more  slowly  than 
reformers  will  bring  themselves  to  perceive, 
but,  after  all,  they  grind  as  fine  as  the  prophets 
wish. 

The  above  characteristics  of  Jesus  will  pre- 
pare us  to  moot  the  most  difficult  problem  of 
His  biography.  We  refer,  of  course,  to  His 
exaggerated  claims.  Undoubtedly  He  in- 
sisted upon  a  preeminence  nothing  short  of 
divine.  Said  He,  "I  and  the  Father  are 
one!"  "He  in  me  and  I  in  Him!"  He  even 
went  so  far  as  to  declare  that  none  might  ap- 
proach God  except  through  Him,  as  He  was 
the  Way,  and  whoso  walked  through  Him 
would  attain  God,  and  in  Him  perceive  the 
Father.  He  was  "the  True  Vine,"  and  the 


212    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

righteous  were  His  branches.  He  was  the  Liv- 
ing Bread,  and  whoso  would  live  must  eat  His 
flesh  and  drink  His  blood.  He  was  the  Door, 
and  to  climb  in  any  other  way  was  burglary 
of  God's  house.  He  was  the  Living  Resur- 
rection and  the  Good  Shepherd.  He  was  the 
Sent;  He  came  down  from  heaven—  " before 
Abraham  was  I  am!"  Imagine  Elijah  or 
Isaiah,  Luther  or  Whitfield,  saying  to  audi- 
ences :  "  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  labor  and 
are  heavy  laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest. 
Take  my  yoke  upon  you,  and  learn  of  me;  for 
I  am  meek  and  lowly  of  heart:  and  ye  shall 
find  rest  unto  your  souls!" 

That  this  was  no  actual  assumption  of  God- 
hood  we  have  shown  in  plain  denials  from  the 
Master's  lips  in  our  chapter  on  His  claims; 
but  this  concession  will  not  wholly  satisfy  just 
criticism,  and  one  of  two  grave  conclusions 
must  be  valid.  Either  Jesus  was  presumptu- 
ous to  the  very  verge  of  insanity,  or  else  His 
imaginative  nature  was  so  intensely  spiritual 
and  so  wholly  consecrated  that  His  will  had 
indeed  become  the  divine  will  and  Himself 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         213 

thus  veritably  the  gate  and  the  way  to  God. 
The  whole  stress  of  facts  forces  us  to  the  latter 
conclusion,  and  this  is  our  firm  conviction. 
The  personality  of  the  Master,  intense  and 
peculiar  as  it  was,  had  been  devoted  so  entirely 
to  holy  aim  and  control  that  "  Come  unto  me" 
meant  nothing  but  "Come  unto  God."  The 
problem  is  solved  by  the  two  factors,  both 
present  in  highest  degree,  of  imagination  and 
of  spirituality.  It  must  never  be  forgotten  that 
Jesus  was  an  Oriental,  that  the  things  which 
make  up  the  average  Occidental's  life  were 
nothingness  and  vanity  to  Him,  that  only  the 
unseen,  the  spiritual,  the  eternal  seemed  real 
to  Him,  and  that  the  reality  of  this  upper- 
world  of  the  true,  the  beautiful,  and  the 
good  was  vivid  to  white  incandescence. 

We  may  find  frequent  illustration  of  this 
on  a  very  humble  plane,  perhaps,  in  the  fidel- 
ity of  the  general  manager  of  some  great 
corporation,  who  has  for  many  years  identified 
himself  with  its  interests,  until  at  last  he  has 
come  to  respond  to  business  queries  in  the 
first  person.  He  is  asked,  "Will  your  com- 


214    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

pany  do  this  or  that?"  and  his  reply  is,  "No, 
really  I  can  not,"  or,  "Yes,  indeed,  I  will," 
the  answer  being  not  the  language  of  assump- 
tion at  all,  but  only  of  absolute  devotion. 

At  the  famous  discourse  in  Capernaum, 
when  the  audience  took  offense  at  this  mode 
of  thought  in  Jesus  and  petulantly  insisted 
upon  interpreting  his  extravagances  of  rhetoric 
literally,  Jesus  was  surprised  that  they  should 
have  so  misunderstood  Him.  He  argued  in 
His  own  mind  that  they  ought  to  have  per- 
ceived that  His  words  were  "spirit"  and 
"life."  "Why  do  ye  not  understand  my 
speech  ?"  He  queried,  in  perplexity,  of  the  same 
sort  of  critics  in  Jerusalem.  They  were  too 
stupid  to  see  that  His  language  was  phosphor- 
escent with  spiritual  intent. 

There  is  one  other  instance  in  history  of 
absolute  identification  of  personality  with  the 
Divine.  This  was  the  case  of  Gautama 
Buddha,  Whole-souled  consecration  and  in- 
tense humanity  in  time  identified  him,  in  his 
own  self-attitude,  with  that  periodic  Buddha 
whose  reincarnation  from  time  to  time  it  was 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  JESUS         215 

supposed,  and  he  believed,  brought  guidance 
to  erring  man.  He,  too,  was  a  man,  yet  he 
became  by  holiness  of  life  and  loftiness  of  aim 
a  Voice  of  the  Eternal,  the  embodiment  of 
virtue,  the  personified  Way  of  Life.  That  the 
All  should  speak  on  Gautama's  lips  never 
seemed  incongruous  to  his  disciples. 

Both  Gautama  and  Jesus,  without  intent  to 
glorify  self,  without  shadow  of  arrogance,  nay, 
in  utmost  humility,  so  sank  personality  in 
duty  and  service  as  to  seem  to  themselves  sa- 
viors of  men  and  the  Mouthpiece  of  God. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE   PERSONALITY   OF   JESUS  SHOWN   IN 
HIS  ATTITUDE  TOWARD  INSTITUTIONS 

TESUS  found  three  great  institutions  firmly 
established — the  State,  the  Church,  and 
the  Family — Rome,  the  Temple,  the  House- 
Caesar,  the  Hierarchy,  One's  Brethren.  He 
therefore  exacted  of  His  disciples  a  threefold 
service,  of  loyalty,  of  piety,  and  of  morality. 

Toward  the  state,  the  Prophet  did  not 
teach  treason;  His  disciples  must  "render 
unto  Caesar  the  things  which  are  Caesar's," 
and  it  became  even  Himself  to  "fulfil  all 
righteousness." 

Undoubtedly  Jesus  knew  perfectly  well  that 
the  doctrine  of  His  message  would  dethrone 
the  emperor  and  unseat  all  earthly  potentates. 
His  Kingdom  was  not  only  unlike  the  king- 
doms of  this  world  and  came  not  "with  obser- 
vation," it  was  an  empire  within  the  empire 

216 


PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS  217 

and  inside  the  very  soul  which,  when  worked 
outward  into  custom  and  institution,  would 
revolutionize.  He  was  not  a  rebel,  and  yet 
He  taught  insurrectionary  doctrine. 

Most  significantly  He  said  to  His  disciples, 
"The  Kingdom  of  God  is  within  you!"  The 
true  believer  was  thus  not  only  a  subject  of 
Caesar,  he  was  citizen  of  an  invincible,  spir- 
itual, eternal  commonwealth,  his  allegiance 
supremely  to  God  and  the  truth.  Therefore, 
though  bidding  His  followers  heed  the  laws 
and  reverence  rulers,  Jesus  called  them  to  a 
spirit  of  self-respect  inconsistent  with  sub- 
serviency, and  therein  laid  the  foundations  for 
possible  martyrdom,  for  heroism  in  defense  of 
all  truth,  and  ultimately  for  civil  as  well  as 
religious  liberty. 

That  He  cherished  hope  of  some  new  social 
order  appears  probable  in  view  of  His  intense 
emphasis  upon  the  fact  that  the  Kingdom  was 
"at  hand,"  and  of  His  own  expectation  of 
"coming  with  power."  The  disciples  should 
encounter  the  opposition  of  the  world  but  were 
not  to  be  dismayed,  as  He  "had  overcome  the 


218    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

world."  There  should  be  goats  as  well  as 
sheep  among  the  nations,  but  Judgment  should 
be  had;  the  Son  of  Man  should  sit  upon  the 
throne  of  His  glory,  and  the  norm  of  that  per- 
fected society  should  be  disposition  to  aid  the 
poor  (Matt.  25:31-45).  This  idea  of  social 
organization  was  no  dream  of  conquest  and 
cruel  domination,  it  involved  no  hierarchy  and 
admitted  of  no  possibility  of  tyranny.  It 
trusted  and  expected  much  of  humanity.  In 
this  Kingdom  Come,  men  should  forgive  their 
enemies,  lend  to  borrowers  without  exaction 
of  interest  or  close  scrutiny  of  collateral,  and 
give  away  without  hope  of  return;  hence, 
there  should  be  no  master  and  no  slave,  no 
rich,  no  poor,  no  oppression,  no  greed,  no 
luxury. 

This  expectation  of  the  Master  was  the 
germ  of  Millennial  hopes,  which  have  both 
blessed  and  cursed  Christendom,  which  have 
both  forwarded  and  retarded  civilization. 

The  attitude  of  the  Master  toward  the  State, 
then,  was  not  quite  that  of  unquestioning 
loyalty  and  patriotism,  but  of  temporary 


PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS  219 

tolerance  with  the  hope  of  betterment  through 
moral  forces  working  by  love. 

Toward  the  Church,  the  Temple,  the  Hier- 
archy, Jesus  maintained  a  sort  of  armed  truce. 
He  does  not  seem  to  have  frequented  the 
synagogues,  and  from  that  at  Nazareth  He 
was  ejected  with  violence  for  what  the  congre- 
gation deemed  infidel  utterances.  Driving 
the  traders  from  the  Temple  and  hurling  sar- 
castic defiance  against  its  sacerdotal  authori- 
ties, He  declared  that  sacred  edifice  "My 
"Father's  House."  In  short,  as  we  now 
should  word  the  facts,  He  was  neither  a  church- 
going  man  nor  orthodox.  His  dissent  amount- 
ed to  hostility,  so  far  as  the  ecclesiastical 
leaders  of  the  people  were  concerned—  "  For 
I  say  unto  you,  that  except  your  righteous- 
ness exceed  the  righteousness  of  the  Scribes 
and  Pharisees,  ye  shall  in  no  case  enter  into 
the  Kingdom  of  Heaven/'  In  other  words  he 
deemed  the  clergy  of  the  day  not  only  defective 
in  character  and  in  wisdom  but  not  even  eligi- 
ble to  the  Kingdom.  The  Jewish  Church  was 


220    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

not  within  the  real  pale.  The  new  order  set 
up  a  higher  ethical  standard  than  the  old,  and 
even  entrance  to  the  new  was  impossible  to  the 
old  ideal. 

He  neglected  ritual  and  ridiculed  scrupu- 
lous ceremonial  observance,  and  sharply  criti- 
cized the  rabbinic  law  when  it  ran  counter  to 
what  He  considered  sound  morals,  as,  for 
instance,  in  the  matter  of  the  Corban  (Matt. 
15 :  5).  If,  at  one  time,  He  declared  that  "  till 
heaven  and  earth  pass,  one  jot  or  one  tittle 
shall  in  no  wise  pass  from  the  law,  till  all  be 
fulfilled,"  He  referred  not  to  legalities  but  the 
unfolding  ethics  of  the  ancient  history  of  His 
people. 

His  whole  career  was  a  protest  against  the 
domination  of  synagogues,  the  tyranny  of 
priestcraft,  the  emptiness  of  formalism  and 
the  vanity  of  professions.  His  ecclesiasticism 
was  summed  up  in  the  words,  "  God  is  a  Spirit, 
and  they  that  worship  Him  must  worship  Him 
in  Spirit  and  in  truth!" 

His  disciples  did  not  at  first  appreciate  this 
scope  of  ethical  and  religious  vision,  this 


PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 

every whereness  of  point  of  view,  this  catholic- 
ity of  charity,  but  always  the  Master  was  pre- 
paring them  for  the  final  revelation.  His 
purpose  and  method  in  this  appear  well  in 
the  story  of  the  healing  of  the  daughter  of  the 
Syrophenician  woman,  and,  as  this  narrative 
is  very  significant  in  its  bearings  upon  the 
whole  matter,  we  will  give  it  at  some  length. 
Jesus  had  chanced  upon  the  coast  of  Phoe- 
nicia, and  a  woman  of  Canaan,  a  heathen,  fol- 
lowed Him  in  the  way  piteously  crying  out, 
"Have  mercy  on  me,  O  Lord,  Thou  Son  of 
David!  My  daughter  is  grievously  vexed 
with  a  devil!"  The  Master,  however,  for  His 
own  reasons,  paid  no  attention  to  her,  until 
the  disciples,  their  prejudices  overcome  by 
sympathy,  besought  Him  with  entreaty  to 
send  her  away  with  the  blessing  she  craved. 
Now  mark  the  reply,  exactly  parodying  their 
own  oft-spoken  bigotry:  "I  am  not  sent  but 
unto  the  lost  sheep  of  the  House  of  Israel!" 
The  sequel  shows  this  utterance  to  have  been 
ironical.  He  was  using  not  His  own,  but  their 
weapons  with  which  to  slay  them.  He  was 


222    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

shaming  them  with  their  own  prejudices.  It 
was  a  gentle  irony  which  thus  limited  His 
mission  and  bounded  His  sympathies.  Jesus 
was  much  given  to  this  form  of  pictorial  ex- 
pression. Thus  it  was  irony  when  He  said  to 
the  Pharisees,  "They  that  be  whole,  need  not 
a  physician,  but  they  that  are  sick.  ...  I  am 
come  not  to  call  the  righteous,  but  sinners  to 
repentance."  It  was  irony  when  He  said,  in 
gentle  rebuke  to  His  drowsy  disciples  that  last 
night  in  Gethsemane,  "  Sleep  on  now  and  take 
your  rest.  Behold  the  hour  is  at  hand  and  the 
Son  of  Man  is  betrayed  into  the  hands  of  sin- 
ners!" The  Syrophenician  woman  seems  to 
have  discerned  the  Master's  hidden  meaning, 
and  it  may  be  that  her  woman's  wit  perceived 
the  whole  purpose  of  His  delay  and  reluctance. 
She  made  profound  obeisance  before  the 
Prophet  and  cried  out,  "Lord,  help  me!  Lord, 
help  me!"  Then  Jesus,  evidently  having  the 
puzzled  disciples  in  mind,  and  thinking  to  test 
yet  further  the  faith  of  the  poor  mother, 
turned  to  her,  and,  using  just  such  language 
as  any  common  Jew  would  have  uttered 


PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS  223 

under  like  circumstances,  said  to  her:  "It  is 
not  meet  to  take  the  children's  bread  and  to 
cast  it  to  dogs!"  This  seemed  a  hard  and 
cruel  reproach,  but  was  only  like  what  the 
disciples  were  constantly  themselves  saying  to 
and  of  heathens.  Jesus  was  only  repeating 
bluntly  before  her  face  what  every  one  of  them 
would  say,  without  thought  of  injustice,  be- 
hind the  woman's  back.  No  doubt  He  in- 
tended that  they  should  talk  on  His  lips,  and 
should,  in  the  very  incongruity  of  the  sound 
of  it,  perceive  the  wrongfulness  of  their  atti- 
tude toward  the  Gentile  world.  Was  the 
mother  now  in  despair?  did  she  resent  the 
seeming  insult?  did  she  turn  sorrowfully 
away  ?  Not  at  all.  She  seems  to  have  under- 
stood the  Prophet  perfectly,  and  would  take 
nothing  as  insult  and  suffer  no  discourage- 
ment. "Truth,  Lord,"  replied  the  quick- 
witted and  eager  suppliant,  "yet  the  dogs  eat 
of  the  crumbs  which  fall  from  the  Master's 
table!"  We  can  see  the  wise  and  gentle  smile 
that  breaks  like  dawn  over  the  Prophet's  face 
and  the  kind  glance  now  resting  on  the  pleader 


224    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

who  was  kneeling  before  Him,  as,  feeling  that 
the  lesson  was  learned  in  a  twofold  instruction, 
He  let  irony  give  place  to  admiration  and 
approval:  "Oh,  woman,  great  is  thy  faith;  be 
it  unto  thee  even  as  thou  wilt." 

As  Jesus  considered  the  old  Jewish  ritual 
and  ceremonial  fulfilled  in  His  new  Common- 
wealth of  faith  and  love,  it  was  inevitable  that 
He  should  have  organized  some  outward  em- 
bodiment of  His  Kingdom.  He  spoke  of  the 
Church— "My  Church"  (Matt.  16:18);  He 
gave  rules  for  its  discipline  (Matt.  18:15); 
appointed  twelve  apostles  as  officers,  instituted 
sacraments  (baptism  and  the  Lord's  Supper), 
and  provided  for  its  universal  spread.  Almost 
His  last  injunction  was  His  command  to  go 
into  all  the  world  and  preach  the  Gospel  to 
every  creature. 

"Thou  art  Peter"  (meaning  rock)  said  He 
to  the  boldest  of  His  apostles,  "and  upon  this 
rock  1  will  build  my  church!"  But  Peter 
was  not  the  only  foundation  rock,  he  was  only 
a  type  of  brave,  earnest  believers,  for  the 
Master  immediately  assured  the  apostles  in 


PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS  225 

general,  "  Whatsoever  ye  shall  bind  on  earth, 
shall  be  bound  in  heaven,  and  whatsoever  ye 
shall  loose  on  earth  shall  be  loosed  in  heaven." 
They  all  had  the  power  of  the  keys. 

It  is  significant,  as  throwing  back  light  upon 
the  teachings  of  Jesus,  that,  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, the  pillars  and  foundation  stones  of 
Christian  institutions  are  always  declared  to 
be  men,  not  creeds,  never  forms,  nor  even  his- 
torical memories  however  sacred  and  impres- 
sive, but  men  who,  like  Peter,  are  rocks  in 
firmness  and  integrity.  In  the  First  Epistle 
to  Timothy,  Paul  declared  the  Church  to  be 
the  "Pillar  and  Ground  of  the  Truth,"  and 
by  the  Church  he  evidently  meant  not  any 
corporation,  nor  collective  entity,  nor  control- 
ing  hierarchy,  but  only  the  constituent  mem- 
bers. Peter  himself  proclaimed  Christ  as  the 
Corner-stone,  and  all  disciples  as  "living 
stones."  In  the  Book  of  Revelation,  Jesus  is 
represented  as  assuring  us,  by  the  Spirit,  that 
"  Him  that  overcometh  will  I  make  a  pillar  in 
the  Temple  of  my  God." 

The  Church,   as   Jesus  conceived  it,  was 

15 


226    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

evidently  purposed  to  rest  on  men,  as  pillars 
and  foundation  stones,  and  to  stand  or  fall 
according  to  their  fitness  to  bear  the  burden. 
Of  provisions  for  denominations,  there  is 
no  slightest  trace  in  records  of  the  sayings  of 
the  Master.  Our  Protestantism  of  to-day,  no 
less  than  its  Romanism,  would  have  excited 
amazement  and  indignation  in  the  Master's 
mind,  could  He  have  foreseen  it.  Protestant- 
ism's excessive  emphasis  upon  individual  pref- 
erence, its  numerous  subdivisions  on  lines  of 
prejudice,  pride,  ignorance,  and  fanaticism, 
its  incessant  generation  of  new  sects,  its  seclu- 
sive  aristocratic  ideas  of  parish  life,  its  system 
of  private  properties  and  exclusive  claims  in 
the  House  of  God,  its  absurd  and  baneful 
practise  of  what  can  be  no  better  named  and 
characterized  than  by  the  phrase  "candidate 
chewing,"  its  dire  struggles  not  to  help  man- 
kind but  to  pay  the  bills  of  its  own  pretentious 
and  local  extravagances,  its  rivalries,  its  jeal- 
ousies, its  fairs,  its  grab-bags,  and  its  theat- 
ricals— all  these  evils  were  apparently  not 
foreseen,  and  surely  not  provided  for,  in  the 


PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS  227 

Master's  ideal  of  His  Church.  Sectarian  bodies 
may,  indeed,  as  George  Eliot  averred,  get 
"some  warmth  of  brotherhood  by  walling  in 
the  sacred  fire,"  but  the  sacred  fire  was  surely 
not  lighted  at  the  beginning  with  such  base 
intent. 

Toward  the  family  Jesus  assumed  an  atti- 
tude of  positive  admonition.  The  family, 
cursed  with  the  bane  of  polygamy,  easy  di- 
vorce, and  marital  infidelity,  existed  in  the 
days  of  the  Master  in  only  rudimentary  con- 
dition. Human  beings  mated  and  procreated, 
and  did  not  altogether  escape  the  sweet  thrall- 
doms  of  domestic  relations;  but  social  exist- 
ence was  on  a  low  level,  the  wife  had  few 
rights,  the  husband  granted  her  scant  respect 
and  less  love,  and  the  family  idea  was  most 
regnant  in  the  position  and  authority  of  the 
mother-in-law. 

The  admonitions  of  Jesus  were  of  startling 
originality  and  of  no  little  severity.  He  in- 
sisted upon  one  husband  and  one  wife,  and 
no  divorce  except  for  infidelity — upon  love 


228    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

and  purity  in  marriage,  upon  faithfulness  unto 
death,  upon  mutual  devotion  to  children,  who 
were  to  be  viewed  as  seals  of  tenderness  and 
pledges  of  sobriety.  Divorce  with  remarriage 
was  adultery,  and  even  to  look  upon  a  woman 
with  lustful  thought  was  nothing  short  of 
adultery.  The  greatness  of  a  man  was  also 
the  greatness  of  his  mate.  So  a  husband  was 
called  to  love  his  wife,  and  for  her  he  must 
forsake  all  others,  and  love  was  love  forever 
more. 

Thus  the  family  was  a  Divine  institution, 
and  marriage  little  short  of  a  sacrament. 


PART  FIFTH 

REFLECTIONS 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  COST  OF  SALVATION 

death  of  Jesus  on  a  malefactor's 
cross  was  the  most  pitiful  event  in 
human  history.  Misunderstood,  slandered, 
betrayed — falsely  accused  and  unjustly  con- 
demned— He  died  as  a  felon,  between  mur- 
derers. Six  days  before  the  rabble  had  hailed 
Him  King,  and  had  cast  their  gala  raiment  in 
His  way  and  waved  palm-branches  in  token  of 
His  expected  victory  over  all  foes;  then,  after 
having  shouted  before  Pilate's  judgment  bar, 
"Crucify  Him!  Crucify  Him!"  they  wagged 
their  empty  heads  with  the  chief  priests  on 
Calvary  and  said,  derisively,  with  the  Phari- 
sees, "  Let  Christ,  the  King  of  Israel,  descend 
now  from  the  cross,  that  we  may  see  and  be- 
lieve!" And  the  while  His  chosen  disciples, 
who  had  shared  every  hardship  with  Him  and 
had  been  so  eager  to  be  baptized  with  His 

231 


232    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

fiery  baptism, — quarreling  with  one  another 
for  place  at  His  right  hand  and  on  His  left,— 
were  scattered  every  one  to  his  own.  It  had 
all  seemingly  ended  in  the  cruel  mockery  of 
the  fling  of  scorn:  "He  saved  others,  Himself 
He  can  not  save!"  Yet  most  sublime  was 
His  triumph  over  fear  and  pain  when  His  great 
heart  sighed  out  life  with  an  "It  is  finished. 
Father,  into  Thy  hands  I  commend  my 
spirit." 

He  who  reads  aright  the  meaning  of  the 
crucifixion  has  solved  the  problem  of  life. 

At  first  glance,  the  death  of  Jesus  only 
illustrated  the  fact  that  intense  personality 
consecrated  to  great  ends  costs  high.  It  has 
cost  heroes,  in  all  ages,  their  popularity  and 
peace  of  mind;  it  has  cost  those  heroes 
who  were  also  martyrs — and  there  have  been 
many,  martyrs  of  faith  and  martyrs  of  science 
— their  lives.  Consecration  of  personality  to 
great  ends  means  thinking  ahead  of  your 
neighbors,  and  they  may  not  catch  up  in  time. 
This  involves  charge  of  oddity,  conceit,  and 
obtrusiveness.  On  the  coast  of  Maine,  off 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  233 

Mt.  Desert  Island,  twenty-five  miles  from 
land,  there  is  a  lighthouse  on  a  rock.  One 
man,  his  wife  and  his  children,  keep  ward 
and  watch  in  perfect  isolation.  Many  a 
brave  and  wise  man  or  woman  lives  thus  in 
advance  of  even  the  outlying  shores  of  public 
opinion,  trimming  the  lamp  that  shines  over 
the  stormy  deep,  the  salvation  of  the  wave- 
tossed  mariner — but  in  solitude,  all  alone. 
Jesus,  on  the  last  night  in  which  He  was  be- 
trayed, said  to  His  disciples  as,  misunder- 
stood by  them,  a  lone  stranger  in  a  busy 
world,  He  felt  the  awful  foreshadowing  of 
death  draw  over  Him,  "Behold,  the  hour 
cometh,  yea,  is  now  come,  that  ye  shall  be 
scattered  every  man  to  his  own,  and  shall  leave 
me  alone!"  So  it  then  was,  so  it  has  been 
everywhere,  and  so  it  shall  be  forevermore! 

Many  a  true  soul  may  say  in  the  lines  of 
Victor  Hugo: 

"My  spirit  endures  like  a  rocky  isle 

Amidst  the  ocean  of  Fate, 
The  thunderstorm  is  my  domicile, 

The  hurricane  is  my  mate." 


234    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

But,  on  afterthought,  the  cost  of  heroism 
is  seen  to  be  the  pain  of  that  sacrifice  which 
saves  the  world.  So  came,  and  suffered,  the 
thought-creators,  the  reformers,  and  all  leaders 
in  theory,  ethics  and  religion ;  and  so  through 
them  originated  change  of  standpoints,  growth 
in  ideas,  and  progress  of  humanity.  Without 
this,  human  intelligence  would  have  been 
mere  hereditary  instinct;  what  we  call  the 
State  would  have  become  crystalized  into  exact 
prisms  of  public  behavior  like  the  changeless- 
ness  of  a  bee-colony;  the  Church,  could  it  ever 
have  arisen,  would  have  stagnated;  science 
would  have  been  primitive  babble,  and  relig- 
ion mere  fear  and  muttering.  Had  there  been 
no  heroes  in  human  history,  there  could  and 
would  have  been  no  human  history. 

The  death  of  Jesus  is  to  be  interpreted  in 
light  of  these  facts.  It  is  significant  that  the 
cost  of  His  mission  was  symbolized  for  the 
Master  by  His  cross,  and  that  over  the  cross 
Pilate,  by  a  curious  coincidence  of  Roman 
scorn,  nailed  a  writing  declaring  Him  a  King. 
Never  did  fate  work  a  more  felicitous  parable 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  235 

of  event — the  cross  was  to  become  His  throne, 
sacrifice  was  indeed  king.  This  was  the 
sublime  fact  of  what  we  call  the  Atonement 
in  pictorial  dress,  and  it  has  proved  of  such 
tremendous  power  over  human  thought  and 
action  because  the  fulfilment  of  a  universal 
law  of  virtue. 

For  centuries  theologians  have  been  asking 
themselves  the  famous  question  of  Anselm, 
"Cur  Deus  homo?"  Why  must  a  Prophet 
sent  of  God  don  the  crown  of  thorns  and  be 
crucified,  in  order  to  save  and  to  reign? 
Many  ingenious  answers  have  been  devised, 
but  the  solution  has  always  been  near  at 
hand.  Ask  why  the  mother  must  sacrifice 
her  days  and  her  nights,  her  health  and 
strength,  and,  it  may  be,  her  life,  to  her 
children?  Ask  why  the  soldier  must  leave 
his  home  and  loved  ones,  his  business  and 
ambitions,  and  go  forth  to  defend  his  country 
and  to  die  in  a  ditch?  Ask  why  Giordano 
Bruno  and  Cecco  d'Ascoli  must  be  burned  to 
death  for  seeking  and  proclaiming  the  facts 
God  gave  them  eyes  to  see  when  others  were 


236   JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

blind  ?  Ask  why  Savonarola  perished  in  the 
flames  for  wisdom  beyond  his  age  ?  This  line 
of  necessity  is  Nature's  profoundest  sugges- 
tion, History's  strange  greatness,  Religion's 
awful  mystery. 

Nature  prepares  us  for  this  marvel.  The 
law  of  atonement  is  prefigured  in  all  her 
arrangements  and  works,  and  what  seems 
lower  is  by  her  always  sacrificed  to  what  she 
apparently  esteems  higher.  Every  natural 
end  is  a  means  for  the  attainment  of  higher 
ends,  and  those  higher  are  offered  up  to  aims 
beyond.  In  the  vegetable  world,  inorganic 
substance  is  sacrificed  to  life;  in  the  animal 
world,  all  life  preys  upon  life — nothing,  in  the 
struggle  for  existence,  survives  except  by 
slaughter. 

When  one  comes  to  human  history  the  law 
assumes  a  higher  form,  and  we  find  that 
while  Nature  is  blindly  offering  up  one  man 
to  another,  the  many  to  the  few,  the  weak  to 
the  strong,  the  witless  to  the  shrewd,  there 
appears  among  men  a  new,  voluntary,  and, 
therefore,  noble  sacrifice,  and  at  once  life 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  237 

rises  above  the  brutal  conflict  for  survival 
into  a  realm  of  self-immolation  of  heroism. 
It  is  now  that  comes  the  mother  and  her  self- 
denials,  the  soldier  and  true  patriotism,  the 
martyr  and  his  words  of  forgiveness  amid 
flames.  Every  page  of  history  is  illustrated, 
yea,  made  illustrious,  by  sublime  heroisms; 
and  one  feels,  as  chapter  after  chapter  is  read, 
that  man,  though  he  may  have  descended 
from  brutes,  has  somehow,  in  some  regards, 
won  the  constitution  of  angels. 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  alchemists,  in 
their  vain — though,  as  recent  discoveries  have 
shown,  not  so  foolish — search  after  the  Philos- 
opher's Stone,  gave  to  the  earthenware  ves- 
sels in  which  their  minerals  and  metals  were 
heated  the  name  of  crucible,  from  the  Latin 
word  crux — a  cross;  and  herein  we  have  pre- 
served the  very  ancient  belief  that  Nature 
must  be  crucified,  ere  she  will  reveal  her 
secrets.  The  stone  that  should  transmute  all 
things  into  gold  could  be  obtained  only  through 
fiery  tortures.  Did  wise  men,  in  this,  argue 
backward  from  the  necessities  of  human 


238    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

nature?  Did  they  infer  this  from  the  mani- 
fest fact  that  character  must  go  into  the 
crucible  and  into  the  fiery  furnace,  if  we  would 
convert  it  into  that  which  on  touch  can  trans- 
form society  for  its  good?  It  would  seem 
so. 

Some  years  ago,  on  a  fast  express  between 
New  York  and  Philadelphia,  through  some 
displacement,  the  fire  in  the  furnace  of  the 
locomotive  came  back  in  angry  flames  upon 
the  engineer,  and  the  cab  filled  with  tongues 
of  flame  and  burning  gas.  The  engineer  and 
his  assistant  hastily  retreated  over  the  tender 
to  the  baggage-car,  and  the  train  rushed  for- 
ward, bereft  of  the  watchful  eye  and  hand 
that  guaranteed  safety  for  hundreds  of  lives. 
For  a  few  dreadful  moments  the  iron  monster, 
belching  forth  flame,  masterless,  and  wild, 
plunged  forward.  Then  a  man  scrambled 
over  the  tender  and  down  into  the  cab,  into 
smoke  and  fire,  and  in  a  moment  the  monster 
was  tamed,  the  train  was  stopped,  and  one 
more  crippled  engineer  lay  there  to  die  soon 
in  agony!  History  is  resplendent  with  such 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  239 

instances  of  pure  self-denying  heroism  among 
all  classes,  in  all  ages,  climes,  and  conditions. 
And  we  glory  in  this  possibility  of  human 
character;  we  plume  ourselves  upon  the  fact 
that  mankind  is  capable  of  such  things.  And 
yet  it  seems  irrational  that  one  should  die  for 
another.  But  we  rejoice  in  it.  It  appears 
beautiful  to  us  that 

"The  rose  is  sweetest  washed  in  morning  dew, 
And  love  is  loveliest  when  embalmed  in  tears." 

But  it  is  hard  to  explain  why  we  feel  so. 
It  is  just  as  difficult  to  explain  why  an  Abra- 
ham Lincoln  must  die  for  his  people,  as  why 
Jesus  was  required  to  suffer  to  accomplish 
His  larger  but  no  more  really  vicarious  mis- 
sion. We  have  struck  an  ultimate  law,  and 
this  lies  back  of  explanation,  as  do  all  ulti- 
mates.  Simply,  it  is  true  that  human  char- 
acter rises  highest  in  deeds  of  self-denial. 

And  so,  when  we  come  to  the  domain  of 
religion  proper,  we  are  not  surprised  to  find 
the  sacrificial  idea  always  foremost;  there  is 
always  an  altar  and  an  offering.  Piety  never 


240    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

feels  at  rest  unless,  somehow,  its  worship 
exacts  cost.  The  working  of  this  law  in 
paganism  and  among  superstitious  people  has, 
of  course,  been  in  much  grossness  and  cruelty 
— the  mother  has  given  her  babe  to  the  sacred 
river;  the  father  has  burned  his  first-born  son 
on  the  brazen  knees  of  Moloch ;  the  maid  has 
yielded  up  to  Baal  her  virtue,  or  the  votary 
has  consecrated  to  the  sky -gods  his  life; 
statues  of  divinities  have  dripped  with  human 
blood,  and  altars  have  groaned  under  the 
horrid  load  of  human  victims.  And  some- 
times the  pagan  perceives  the  higher  mean- 
ings of  the  law.  From  some  tomb  inscriptions 
of  ancient  Egypt  we  select  this:  "O!  Isis, 
since  my  soul  is  only  one  tear  from  thine  eyes, 
let  it  fall,  as  dew,  upon  other  souls ;  and  while 
I  am  dying  for  others,  let  the  perfume  of  their 
watered  souls  mount  to  thee.  Behold  me,  O ! 
Isis!  ready  to  be  thus  sacrificed!"  Lafcadio 
Hearn  tells  of  a  Japanese  boy,  only  fourteen 
years  old,  who  killed  himself  in  order  that  his 
spirit  might  wait  upon  the  spirit  of  a  child 
who  had  died — his  master's  little  son.  Which 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  241 

fact  recalls  a  most  touching  instance  of  self- 
immolation  to  work  salvation,  recorded  in 
Rein's  great  work  on  Japan.  It  is  the  legend 
of  a  woman  whose  husband  was  at  sea  fishing 
but  caught  in  a  great  storm.  Picture  this 
young  wife,  standing  on  a  cliff,  weeping  and 
wringing  her  hands,  as  the  winds  howl  about 
her,  as  the  waves  break  with  hoarse  cry,  and 
clouds  of  foam  and  mist  on  the  shore  beneath. 
Yonder  in  the  tempest  is  her  beloved:  the 
angry,  jealous  gods  will  have  him  down  into 
the  bottomless  deep!  What  shall  she  give  to 
appease  the  ravenous  spirits  of  wind  and 
wave?  Gold? — she  has  none.  Precious  things  ? 
—ah,  but  she  is  very  poor!  Only  one  treas- 
ure does  she  possess,  which  no  crudest  divinity 
will  despise — her  life!  She  will  die  for  her 
beloved  and  so,  perchance,  save  him!  And 
into  the  foaming  deep  she  springs  to  appease 
the  gods  and  ransom  her  husband. 

Jesus  of  Nazareth,  in  provoking  persecu- 
tion and  in  challenging  the  death  of  the  re- 
former, inevitable  in  His  days,  for  love  of 
men,  simply  responded  to  this  sublime  in- 

16 


242    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

stinct.  It  was  in  the  nature  of  things  that 
one  of  such  elevation  of  character,  of  such 
absolute  consecration  to  right  living  and 
teaching,  should  seek  the  line  of  greatest  re- 
sistance and  destroy  Himself  thereby.  He 
could  save  to  the  uttermost  only  by  supreme 
loss.  He  could  not  establish  the  Heavenly 
Kingdom  by  assuming  a  purple  robe  of  im- 
perialism, a  crown  of  gems,  and  a  scepter  of 
jeweled  gold,  by  ascending  a  throne  of  ivory, 
and  encircling  Himself  with  flatterers  and 
legionaries.  Had  He  ruled  the  nations  with 
a  rod  of  iron,  and  dashed  them  to  pieces  like 
a  potter's  vessel,  according  to  popular  expec- 
tation, His  gospel  would  have  won  only  place- 
hunters  and  sycophants,  bloody  defeats  or  use- 
less victories.  The  work  He  had  at  heart  could 
be  accomplished  only  by  self-immolation,  and, 
as  a  Messiah,  He  could  rule  but  through  sym- 
pathy, self-sacrifice,  and  forgiveness. 

There  is  a  beautiful  fitness  in  the  medieval 
legend  that  the  tree  from  which  the  cross  was 
made  grew  out  of  a  seed  which  fell  in  the 
Garden  of  Eden. 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  243 

Call  to  mind  how  Jesus,  at  the  last  Paschal 
feast,  in  the  upper  chamber,  as  He  took  the 
usual  cup  of  wine,  named  the  "cup  of  thanks- 
giving," said,  "This  is  my  blood  of  the  new 
covenant!"  B'rith,  or  covenant,  was  the 
ancient  Hebrew  substantive  for  that  compact 
between  warring  tribes  or  individuals  in  feud, 
which,  in  the  primitive  ferocity  of  human 
society,  prevented  or  mitigated  conflict  and 
cruelty.  Wars  and  feuds  were  ended  by  a 
b'rith,  understandings  and  confederacies  were 
confirmed  by  a  b'rith.  The  b'rith  was  sealed 
by  a  sacrifice  of  life  and  a  flow  of  blood.  The 
occasion  was  often  celebrated  by  a  feast  and 
commemorated  by  a  heap  of  stones,  and  it 
took  the  place  of  contracts,  treaties,  and  inter- 
national law  in  modern  times.  This  b'rith 
was  a  very  sacred  affair,  and  he  who  violated 
the  compact  had  not  only  to  dread  the  con- 
tempt of  men,  but  much  more  the  wrath  of 
God.  As  might  be  supposed,  to  picture  one's 
reconciliation  with  the  Almighty  as  a  cove- 
nant, had  long  been  familiar  imagery,  and 
synagogue  readings  and  homilies  often  sent 


244    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

back  the  minds  of  listeners  to  the  covenants 
made  by  God  with  His  people,  with  Adam, 
with  Noah,  with  Abraham,  with  Jacob. 
God's  people  were  bound  by  treaty  to  obedi- 
ence :  holiness  rested  on  a  covenant  with  high 
Heaven.  Sin  was  treason  to  compact;  the  call 
of  the  righteous  obligated  the  Deity,  and  the 
demand  of  God  appealed  to  honor.  The  Ten 
Commandments,  which  seem  to  us  only  an 
ancient  statement  of  moral  law,  were  the  Ten 
Words  of  the  B'rith;  the  holiest  vessel  of  the 
Temple  was  named  the  Arc  of  the  B'rith;  the 
Messiah  was  described  as  the  Angel  or  Mes- 
senger of  the  B'rith;  and  the  people  as  a  race, 
as  themselves  one  party  in  the  compact,  were 
the  Holy  B'rith. 

Hence  the  meaning  of  Jesus  in  applying 
this  imagery  to  Himself  at  that  last  supper. 
His  religion  was  a  new  covenant  with  God, 
His  own  blood  was  the  sacrificial  seal,  the 
supper  was  to  be  perpetuated  as  both  celebrat- 
ing feast  and  commemoration.  By  His  tears 
and  agonies,  by  His  sufferings  and  self-de- 
nials, by  His  bloody  sweat  and  precious  blood, 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  245 

he  Had  signed  and  sealed,  for  His  followers,  a 
holy  union  with  God,  which  should  win  for 
us  divine  aid  and  the  sympathy  of  Heaven. 

The  teaching  of  Jesus,  as  to  His  vicarious 
work,  went  no  farther. 

That  Jesus  came  into  the  world,  primarily, 
bound  on  a  mission  of  sacrifice,  to  make  a 
propitiatory  offering  for  men,  that,  for  instance, 
as  the  earliest  theological  metaphysicians  de- 
clared, He  was  a  literal  ransom  to  the  devil, 
to  buy  us  off — us,  the  victims  of  that  monster's 
rightful  possessory  power;  or  that,  as  later 
and  more  refined  casuists  averred,  he  was  an 
appeasement  to  quench  the  fiery  wrath  of  an 
offended  God;  or  that,  as  others  more  modern 
have  preferred  to  explain,  He  was  a  sop  to  the 
Cerberus  of  abstract  justice  in  the  righteous 
Judge  of  all;  or  that,  to  fall  back  on  the  recent 
governmental  theory,  He  made  a  forensic 
and  impressive  display  of  sharing  in  the  pun- 
ishment to  ease  up  the  loss  of  the  Divine  dig- 
nity, and  the  sullying  by  forgiveness  of  the 
majesty  of  law — all  such  hypotheses  are  the 
mere  presumptions  of  subtle  theorists,  not  the 


246    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

declarations  of  Jesus  Himself,  nor  the  testi- 
mony of  the  records,  nor  the  involvements  of 
any  of  the  Gospel  teachings.  These  casu- 
istries have  been  fabricated  out  of  oriental 
imagery,  picturing  (in  the  original  intent) 
nothing  but  consecration  to  God,  and  sacri- 
ficial love  and  heroism. 

The  bloody  ritual  of  the  Hebrews  has  been 
completely  misunderstood  by  most  Christian 
theologians.  It  taught  neither  appeasement 
nor  literal  substitution.  Doubtless  many  in- 
dividual worshipers,  their  minds  tinged  with 
heathenism,  read  into  the  holy  liturgy  of  word 
and  symbol  meanings  of  the  grove,  the  high 
place,  the  idol  shrine,  but  for  these  misinter- 
pretations the  authors  of  that  sublime  ancient 
worship  were  not  responsible.  It  must  be 
remembered  that,  according  to  the  Hebrew 
physiology,  the  blood  of  any  animal  was  held 
to  be  the  seat  of  its  life,  and  that  in  conse- 
quence, according  to  Hebrew  symbolism,  the 
blood  of  sacrifice  did  but  picture  the  life  of 
consecration.  Blood  shed  on  the  Divine  altar 
was  life  offered  up  to  Jehovah.  The  whole 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  247 

scheme  of  sacrifices  was  a  succession  of  picture 
lessons  in  personal  devotion  to  God  and  duty. 
The  victim  was  supposed  to  be  only  a  parable 
of  the  offerer.  As  the  life  of  the  bullock  or 
the  ram  was  poured  out  in  crimson  tide,  the 
giver  was  saying  to  himself,  "  Here,  Lord,  am 
I.  I  pour  out  my  life  thus  to  Thee,  I  conse- 
crate myself  on  Thine  altar  a  whole  burnt- 
offering."  There  was  probably  no  thought 
among  the  spiritual  and  intelligent  that  Elohim 
could  be  appeased  and  won  merely  by  the 
suffering  and  death  of  the  victims.  As  Isaiah 
indignantly  declared:  "To  what  purpose  is 
the  multitude  of  your  sacrifices  to  me.  Wash 
you,  make  you  clean,  put  away  the  evil  of 
your  doing  from  before  mine  eyes!"  The 
animal  on  the  altar  was  only  a  picture  to  assist 
in  the  worship  of  an  imaginative  and  impres- 
sionable people;  it  was  but  part  of  a  stately 
ritual,  which  all  meant  only  the  personal 
devotion  and  moral  purity  of  the  giver. 

What  has  been  called  the  Atonement  of 
Jesus  was  the  sublimest  antitype  of  the  ancient 
ritual,  the  blood  of  a  Divine  Hero  shed,  that 


248    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

is,  a  heroic  life  offered  up,  in  perfect  sacrifice 
of  heart,  will,  and  substance  to  God.  Hence 
Paul,  though  none  of  the  apostles  more  de- 
lighted in  picturing  the  vicarious  bearing  of 
the  Master's  mission,  so  far  from  being  an 
advocate  of  literal  appeasement,  claimed  that 
himself  shared  in  the  atoning  work  of  His 
Lord,  and  with  himself  all  unselfish  believers. 
"I  bear  in  my  body  the  marks  of  the  Lord 
Jesus,"  he  declared  to  the  Galatians;  and  by 
these  marks,  or  stigmata,  as  it  is  in  the  Greek, 
he  undoubtedly  referred  to  the  nail-prints  on 
the  hands  and  feet  and  the  spear-wound  in  the 
side  of  the  Crucified.  To  the  Colossians  he 
wrote  sadly:  "Who  now  rejoice  in  my  suffer- 
ings for  you  all,  and  fill  up  that  which  is  be- 
hind of  the  afflictions  of  Christ,  in  my  flesh, 
for  His  Body's  sake,  which  is  the  Church." 
If  Jesus  were  appeasement,  so  also  was  Paul, 
though  in  smaller  measure ;  so  also,  doubtless, 
many. 

There  is  a  scene  in  Homer's  Iliad  which  we 
suggest  as  instructive  reading  for  all  advocates 
of  schemes  of  substitution  and  propitiation. 


THE  COST  OF  SALVATION  249 

Priam,  the  aged  King  of  Troy,  kneels  before 
Achilles,  the  slayer  of  Hector,  his  son,  to  be- 
seech of  the  conqueror  the  dead  body  of  his 
boy.  The  monarch  is  unattended,  unpro- 
tected, and,  being  within  the  Grecian  lines, 
his  life  is  forfeit  by  the  cruel  laws  of  war. 
Achilles  is  bloodthirsty  and  unmerciful  as  the 
grave,  yet  the  one  pleads  and  the  other  listens : 

"Unmarked  the  royal  Priam  entered  in 
And  coming  to  Achilles  clasped  his  knees, 
And  kissed  those  fearful  slaughter  dealing  hands, 
By  which  so  many  of  his  sons  had  died. 

.     .     .     .    '  Oh!  revere 
The  gods,  Achilles,  and  be  merciful! 
Calling  to  mind  thy  father — happier  he 
Than  I;  for  I  have  borne  what  no  man  else 
That  dwells  on  earth  could  bear— have  laid  my  lips 
Upon  the  hand  of  him  that  slew  my  son. 
He  spake.    Achilles  sorrowfully  thought 
On  his  own  father.    By  the  hand  he  took 
The  suppliant,  and  with  gentle  force  removed 
The  old  man  from  him.     Both  in  memory 
Of  those  they  loved  were  weeping !": 

Shall  God  be  less  merciful  than  a  blood- 
stained Grecian  conqueror?  Shall  warriors 
weep,  and  only  blood  satisfy  divine  wrath? 


250    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

No!  sacrifice  is  divine,  and  to  be  merciful  is 
the  very  inmost  nature  of  Deity.  The  wrath 
of  God  is  directed  against  wrongdoing;  it  bars 
not  His  mercy  toward  the  penitent  and  needs 
no  appeasement. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

HAS  JESUS  COME  AGAIN? 

thirteenth  chapter,  on  the  Coming 
Jesus,  closed  with  the  statement  that 
the  ages  have  wept  and  laughed  over  the  ex- 
pected advent,  wept  in  grief  of  hope  deferred, 
and  laughed  in  scorn  of  prophecy  made  vain. 
We  now  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  what 
has  actually  happened  calls  not  for  tears,  nor 
justifies  derision.  No  less  wonderful  than  His 
life  and  death  has  proved  the  vitality  of  His 
memory.  For  nearly  nineteen  hundred  years 
believers  have  partaken  of  the  eucharist  in 
remembrance  of  Him,  and  to-day  faith  in  His 
presence  is  as  alert  as  when  He  visibly  walked 
among  His  disciples.  The  power  of  His 
"endless  life"  shows  no  abatement  in  its 
sway  over  imagination  and  conduct.  The 
ages  seem,  after  all,  to  have  verified  His 
promises,  if  in  an  unexpected  way.  What 

251 


252    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  historical  Christ  was  to  Peter  and  Paul 
and  the  Apostolic  Church,  that  He  has  con- 
tinued to  be  to  Christian  devoutness.  It  is 
undeniable  that,  on  His  withrdawal  from 
earth,  Jesus  became  and  remained  the  most 
conspicuous  personality  in  the  world.  Noth- 
ing like  this  is  recorded  in  history.  The  cen- 
turies have  all  come  and  gone,  and  hundreds 
of  millions  of  men  have  passed  over  the 
human  stage,  and  no  personality  has  thus,  in 
any  such  potency  of  seeming  presence,  per- 
sisted but  that  of  Jesus.  What  has  history- 
tame  in  outlines,  blurred  in  colors,  poor,  shad- 
owy drama  of  human  unrest — what  has  history 
worthy  of  supreme  attention  in  its  pitiful 
record  except  that  Christian  civilization  which, 
embodying  all  more  ancient  wisdom,  surviv- 
ing all  the  shocks  of  fate,  to-day  a  living 
force,  urges  the  world  on  to  a  future  better 
than  its  past  ?  The  poets  that  sang  are  dead ; 
the  philosophers  who  thought,  the  sculptors, 
orators,  and  statesmen  all  have  succumbed, 
and  the  great  who  to-day  live  also  shall  die. 
Truths  remain,  but  their  discoverers  pass  on; 


HAS  JESUS  COME  AGAIN?  253 

principles  are  triumphant,  but  the  heroes  who 
fought  for  them  have  perished.  Only  Jesus,  of 
them  all,  quick  as  of  yore,  still  and  ever  thinks 
in  men's  judgments,  utters  Himself  in  their 
aspirations  and  sacrifices,  rebukes,  subdues, 
and  saves  human  society.  Well  declared 
Bushnell  of  Him :  "  He  exhaled  an  atmosphere 
of  God,  that  should  fill,  and  finally  renew,  all 
creation,  bathing  all  climes  and  times  and 
ages  with  its  dateless,  ineradicable  power." 

The  most  effectual  acknowledgment  of  this 
is  the  fact  that  hostile  critics  of  the  Christian 
faith  attack  the  churches  from  the  standpoint, 
not  of  heathen  ethics,  but  of  His  Golden  Rule 
and  of  His  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  All  will 
recall  the  beautiful  scene  in  Kingsley's  "Hy- 
patia,"  in  which  that  fair,  noble,  and  chaste 
lady  of  Alexandria  fell  a  victim,  as  a  Neo- 
Platonist  philosopher,  to  the  fury  of  a  rabble 
of  Christian  monks,  and,  as  being  a  heathen, 
was  torn  to  pieces  by  a  fanatic  mob  on  the 
very  steps  of  the  altar  of  a  church.  Seized 
from  her  chariot,  as  she  was  driven  to  her 
lecture  room,  Hypatia  was  dragged  into  the 


254    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

sanctuary  and  was  there  immolated  to  Chris- 
tian bigotry.  But  just  before  they  tore  her 
limb  from  limb,  she  shook  herself  free  from 
her  murderers  and,  springing  upon  the  steps 
of  the  high  altar,  gathering  about  her  naked 
body  her  long  black  hair,  she  lifted  a  white 
arm  in  mute  appeal  to  the  great  image  of 
Jesus  that,  silent,  loomed  above  her.  Never 
did  fiction  put  truth  into  more  artistic  setting, 
and  it  is  so  graphic  because  so  true  to  profound 
law  as  well  as  to  sublime  fact.  Thus,  in  all 
ages  of  the  Church's  history,  in  protest  against 
superstitious  interpretation  of  Scripture, 
against  false  belief,  against  evil  practise  and 
bloody  persecution,  the  last  appeal  has  ever 
been,  and  is,  and  will  be  to  the  Christ,  who 
rises  above  the  altar,  above  the  priest,  above 
all  unreason,  wrong,  and  folly.  Cherish  what 
view  you  will  of  the  personality  of  Jesus — as 
to  its  limitations  or  its  claims — you  may  not 
reasonably  deny  the  tremendous  hold  of  its  at 
least  seeming  presence  upon  modern  civiliza- 
tion. 

We  aver,  without  much  fear  of  contradic- 


HAS  JESUS  COME  AGAIN?  255 

tion,  that  the  fineness  of  modern  civilization 
has  resulted  from  a  growing  conviction  on  the 
part  of  men  of  the  truthfulness  of  the  Glad 
Tidings  of  Jesus  and  of  the  loftiness  of  His 
ideals.  The  Divine  Love,  Human  Brother- 
hood, the  Hope  of  Glory,  the  Christian  Citi- 
zen, the  Christian  Hero,  the  Christly  Woman, 
and  the  Christly  Home — these  thoughts,  de- 
rivable from  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth,  ex- 
panded to  their  full  meaning  and  application, 
have  made  an  old  and  grisly  world  young 
again,  and  have  converted  a  gross  material 
civilization  into  an  enlightenment  of  justice, 
purity,  temperance,  and  peace. 

Mark  you,  it  is  not  Christendom  which  has 
accomplished  this.  Rather  has  Christendom 
disgraced  the  Master,  parodying  His  words 
and  transversing  His  spirit.  Not  the  visible 
Church  nor  the  churches,  not  the  priesthoods 
nor  the  creeds,  have  turned  the  world  upside 
down;  too  much  these  have  ignored  the 
saving  Presence,  and  have  divided,  in  carnal 
strife  and  wicked  jealousies,  over  subtleties  of 
doctrine  and  niceties  of  organization  and 


256    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

ritual,  unfruitful  for  the  progress  of  righteous- 
ness. Only  the  innate  Christly,  slowly  be- 
coming dominant  over  the  human  imagina- 
tion and  action,  has  condemned  the  dark, 
bloody,  and  stupid  past  and  called  for  a 
future  of  restoration  and  achievement. 

Whatever  gains  and  losses  there  have  been 
in  the  march  of  events,  this  is  certainly  true, 
that  the  world  has  grown  gentler;  it  is  less 
cruel  and  rude  and  therefore  more  sensitive  to 
pain,  more  perplexed  at  sight  of  suffering,  less 
horror-stricken  and  more  pensive  in  the  pres- 
ence of  death.  Nature's  struggle  for  exist- 
ence, which  involves  mankind  also  in  its 
entanglements  and  brutalities,  and  which  of 
old  was  viewed  as  a  matter  of  course,  now  stirs 
a  feeling  of  dismay  in  every  earnest  breast,  and 
earth  is  full  of  men  and  women  who  muse  on 
life  gently.  Never  were  men  so  thoughtful  as 
to-day,  and  there  is  coming  into  the  discussion 
of  social  problems  a  new  spirit  of  pity,  of  sad- 
ness, of  magnanimous  yearning,  akin  to  the 
tears  of  Jesus  at  the  tomb  of  Lazarus  and  on 
Mt.  Olivet.  Even  unbelief  scoffs  seldom  now; 


HAS  JESUS  COME  AGAIN?  £57 


it,  too,  thirsts  and  pants  for  truth  to  believe, 
and  for  food  to  satisfy  the  heart's  hunger.  A 
Robert  Ingersoll  stands  at  his  brother's  grave, 
"between  the  icy  peaks  of  two  eternities,"  in 
admitted  horror  of  loneliness  and  grief. 

He  said  He  would  come!  Could  He  have 
appeared  in  an  Advent  any  more  real,  any 
more  comforting  to  believers,  any  more  help- 
ful to  the  world  ? 


CHAPTER  XX 

ANTICHRIST 

OTILL,  that  essential  Christianity  has  been 
instituted,  we  do  not  and  can  not  claim. 

Three  evil  forces  of  tremendous  potency 
have  antagonized  all  efforts  to  realize  in  forms, 
customs,  and  standards  the  Kingdom  of  God, 
which  remains  to-day  what  it  already  was 
when  Jesus  first  came,  the  mere  inner  sway 
of  essential  righteousness  in  the  hearts  of 
individuals. 

Against  visible  Christianity  the  three  pow- 
ers of  Antichrist  have  been  Dogmatism, 
Ecclesiasticism,  and  Capitalism. 

Dogmatism  began  with  Paul  and  culmina- 
ted with  the  Inquisition! 

Ecclesiasticism  began  with  the  Council  of 
Jerusalem  and  culminated  with  the  Council 
of  Trent  and  full-fledged  Romanism. 

258 


ANTICHRIST  259 

And  when  in  a  modern  age  of  intelligence, 
education  and  liberty  these  monsters  lost  their 
hold,  Capitalism  took  their  place,  and  the 
iron  shackles  of  the  Inquisition  and  the 
spider-webs  of  priestcraft  were  replaced  by 
chains  of  gold. 

Of  the  two  first  mentioned  it  is  unnecessary 
for  us  to  speak  at  length,  as  their  indictment 
was  written  and  their  doom  pronounced  long 
ago.  Each  ran  its  evil  course  and  left  its 
trail  of  curse,  and  nothing  we  can  add  to  the 
story  will  render  any  more  impressive  the 
anathemas  of  holy  eloquence  which  good  and 
great  men  have  hurled  at  these  foes  of  right- 
eousness and  travesties  of  Jesus. 

The  case  of  Capitalism  as  a  form  of  Anti- 
christ is  different.  Only  in  modern  times,  as 
civilization  has  developed  along  capitalistic 
lines,  has  this  monster  unveiled  his  grisly 
front.  To  assail  dogmatism  and  ecclesiasti- 
cism  for  the  enlightenment  of  persons  likely  to 
read  this  little  treatise,  would  be  quite  need- 
less, but  the  arraignment  of  Capitalism  in  the 
Church  is  both  novel  and  pertinent  to  the 


260    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

theme.  For  the  Coming  of  Jesus  and  the 
Going  of  His  Church,  consequent  upon  His 
death,  are  correlated  themes. 

The  larger  problem  of  Capitalism  as  an 
economic  question  it  is  not  necessary  to  moot 
in  these  pages.  Whether  riches  be  good  or 
evil,  and  whether  the  modern  methods  of 
accumulation  and  expenditure  be  safe  or  dan- 
gerous for  human  society,  we  are  not  to  ask, 
the  query  not  being  germane  to  our  theme. 

What  we  will  discuss  here  is  the  bearing  of 
modern  Capitalism  upon  church  life  and  pros- 
perity. 

We  are  brought  face  to  face  with  this  mat- 
ter because  of  the  manifest  falling  away  from 
instituted  Christianity  of  one  of  the  three 
classes  that  make  up  our  industrial  system. 

In  this  inquiry  we  can  not  avail  ourselves 
of  direct  instruction  from  Jesus,  for  He  lived 
in  an  age  preceding  entirely  the  conditions  in 
view.  In  the  days  of  the  Master,  wealth  ex- 
isted as  money  in  hand,  precious  things  dis- 


ANTICHRIST  261 

played  or  hoarded  away,  cattle,  real  estate, 
exclusive  privileges,  and  slaves.  Riches  in 
large  amounts  could  come  only  by  inheritance, 
seizure,  or  the  favor  of  rulers.  There  were 
mines  of  considerable  yield  in  precious  stones 
or  metals,  but  they  were  worked  by  slaves  and 
owned  by  princes  or  their  parasites.  There 
was  some  manufacturing  and  much  commerce, 
but  Palestine  was  a  very  poor  country,  and 
even  Jerusalem,  the  capital  city,  was  a 
wretched  little  walled  town,  not  comparable 
with  a  fifth-rate  city  of  our  age.  The  corpora- 
tion, as  a  civic  person,  had  not  been  invented. 
There  were  money-lenders  but  no  banks,  in- 
terest was  paid  on  loans  but  looked  upon  as 
usury  and  despicable.  Riches  were  the  ac- 
companiment of  power,  its  cause,  and  its  prey. 
In  view  of  these  facts,  Jesus  was  naturally 
suspicious  of  the  rich;  He  viewed  them  as 
associated  with  rapacity,  tyranny,  luxury,  and 
vice.  King's  palaces,  fine  raiment,  gluttony, 
and  display  were  on  the  broad  road  to  death. 
Money  was  good  only  for  meeting  the  few 
simple  needs  of  man  and  the  relief  of  the  un- 


262    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

fortunate  and  the  poor.  The  hoarding  of 
treasures  in  a  storeroom  or  vault,  and  the 
luxurious  expenditure  of  the  same,  alike 
aroused  His  antagonism.  "A  man's  life  con- 
sisteth  not  in  the  abundance  of  the  things  he 
possesseth,"  He  constantly  insisted.  When 
the  rich  ruler  came  to  Him  seeking  the  way 
of  life,  He  told  that  really  admirable  young 
man  to  go  sell  all  that  he  had  and  give  to  the 
poor,  as  the  first  step;  and  when  the  youth 
very  naturally  objected,  and  went  away  sorrow- 
ing, He  sighed  and  reflected,  "  How  hard  it  is 
for  a  rich  man  to  enter  into  the  Kingdom  of 
God!"  Such  a  deep  cleft  seemed  to  yawn  be- 
tween riches  and  righteousness.  Hence  the 
bitter  fling  against  the  wealthy,  in  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount:  "Woe  unto  you  that  are  rich! 
For  ye  have  your  consolation !  Woe  unto  you 
that  are  full,  for  ye  shall  hunger!"  Hence, 
also,  the  parable  of  Dives  in  torment  and 
Lazarus  on  Abraham's  bosom,  and  its  seem- 
ingly anarchistic  and  irrational  explanation. 

How  Jesus,  if  He  were  to  live  to-day,  would 
view  the  modern  system  of  Capitalism  it  is 


ANTICHRIST  263 

hard  to  say,  and  we  can  not  infer  this  from 
His  treatment  of  wealth  in  His  own  times. 

But  we  certainly  know  that  modern  wealth 
has  furnished  for  the  churches  a  new  form  of 
Antichrist. 

The  social  structure  of  to-day,  viewed  eco- 
nomically, may  be  divided  into  those  who  labor 
and  those  who  do  not. 

Those  who  do  not  labor — tramps,  beggars, 
criminals,  aftd  the  idle  rich — are  mere  para- 
sites— warts,  wens,  cancers,  vermin — on  the 
body  social,  and  these  do  not  here  further 
concern  us. 

Those  who  do  labor  may  be  divided  into 
three  classes:  the  wage-earners,  the  salary 
winners,  and  the  employers.  We  used  to  talk 
about  the  masses,  but  since  wage-earners  have 
organized  themselves  into  unions  and  federa- 
tions there  are  no  masses  any  more,  and  only 
classes.  Society  is  aligned  now  according  to 
methods  of  labor.  It  is  either  work  of  hands, 
work  of  minds,  or  work  in  employment  of 
hands  and  of  minds. 


264    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

By  wage-earners  we  mean  all  men  and 
women  who  subsist  on  wages  earned  by 
manual  labor,  and  who,  though  they  may 
possess  some  property,  have  it  lying  in  a  home, 
or  in  savings  banks  or  similar  institutions. 

By  salary  winners  we  mean  men  and 
women  who  subsist  by  mental  labor  and  re- 
ceive salaries — clerks,  teachers,  college  pro- 
fessors, superintendents,  ministers,  doctors, 
and  lawyers. 

Both  wage-earners  and  salary  winners  are 
to  be  distinguished  from  the  employers,  who 
have  accumulated  or  inherited  wealth  and 
who  invest  this  in  productive  business,  thereby 
employing  the  other  two  classes  and  enjoying 
use  of  interest,  dividends,  profits — the  farm- 
ers, the  merchants,  the  manufacturers,  the 
shippers,  the  bankers. 

To  repeat,  the  wage-earners,  the  salary  win- 
ners, and  the  employers,  make  up  modern  so- 
ciety considered  economically.  This  is  a  broad 
and  not  perfectly  well-defined  distinction,  but 
for  our  purpose  it  is  sufficiently  exact. 

The  wisdom  or  folly,  the  right  or  wrong,  of 


ANTICHRIST  265 

this  organization  of  society  does  not  now 
concern  us.  We  are  interested  only  in  its 
bearing  upon  instituted  Christianity.  What 
we  will  call  attention  to,  is  the  fact  that  the 
Christian  churches  have  drawn  away  from  the 
wage-earners  and  allied  themselves  to  the 
salaried  and  employing  classes,  and  that  so 
they  have  become  part  of  the  capitalistic  aspect 
of  modern  society. 

Largely  freed  from  the  domination  of 
Dogmatism  and  of  Ecclesiasticism,  they  have 
fallen  under  a  spell  of  Capitalism,  which  ren- 
ders worldly  the  devout  and  unchurches  a 
great  social  class. 

Capitalism  to-day  is  just  as  effectually  de- 
feating the  purpose  of  the  teachings  of  Jesus 
as  did  the  inquisition  and  the  hierarchy  in 
former  ages. 

We  know  that  generally  the  problem  is 
stated  differently,  and  that  we  are  told  that 
the  wage-earners  have  ceased  to  go  to  church, 
as  if  the  fault  were  with  them. 

But  why  do  wage-earners  withdraw  pres- 
ence and  support  from  the  churches  ?  Surely 


266    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

not  because  of  poverty,  as  some  of  them  aver. 
Never  were  wage-earners  so  well  paid  and 
never  were  hours  of  work  so  few;  this  class 
has  increased  income  and  leisure,  and  find 
themselves  able  to  contribute  of  time  and 
money  for  the  success  of  movements  interest- 
ing them.  It  is  not  because  of  unbelief,  as 
others  insist;  for  while  unbelief  abounds  it 
does  not  distinguish  this  class,  and  probably 
they  are  less  well  informed  as  to  the  writings 
of  skepticism  and  more  credulous  than  the 
classes  that  still  cling  to  the  institutes  of 
religion.  Furthermore,  there  is  among  them 
no  inherent  repugnance  to  the  essential  teach- 
ings of  the  Christian  religion;  in  their  argu- 
ments they  constantly  quote  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount ;  they  claim  to  revere  Jesus,  and  as 
an  exponent  of  their  own  interest  and  views: 
they  like  to  be  married  and  buried  by  the 
minister;  they  do  not  delight  in  vice,  nor  scorn 
virtue  more  than  the  others;  their  sense  of 
right  and  wrong  is  as  keen,  and  their  suffer- 
ing in  time  of  pain  and  sorrow  as  poignant. 
Why,  then,  the  growing  cleft  ? 


ANTICHRIST  267 

Perhaps  it  will  help  us  to  observe  that  this 
same  cleft  is  running  into  a  grand  cleavage  of 
separation  from  both  the  salaried  and  the 
employer  classes,  over  the  whole  social  surface. 
Everywhere,  and  in  all  regards,  the  wage- 
earners  are  opposing  a  hostile  front  to  other 
classes,  organizing  for  defense  and  attack. 
It  is  the  hands  of  society  against  the  brains, 
and  long  study  of  the  problem  has  convinced 
the  author  that  underlying  the  increasing  un- 
friendliness of  the  wage-earners  to  the  churches 
lies  that  general  discontent  which  characterizes 
all  organized  labor  with  the  entire  social  fabric 
of  to-day. 

The  whole  trouble  is  the  conviction,  on  the 
part  of  the  wage-earners,  that  the  churches 
are  aristocratic,  the  exclusive  domain  for  the 
salaried  and  employing  classes,  and  no  place 
for  men  and  women  who  own  little  but  their 
own  hands  and  live  by  daily  effort,  and  that 
the  ecclesiastical  systems  all  fortify  wrongs  in 
social  conditions  they  feel  themselves  suffer- 
ing. 

The  pity  of  it  is,  that  this  claim  is  true. 


268    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

The  churches  have  become  the  organs  of 
the  salaried  and  employing  classes. 

The  modern  churches,  Protestant,  Greek, 
or  Romanist — High  Church,  Low  Church, 
Broad  Church — Presbyterian,  Congregational- 
ist,  Methodist,  or  what  not,  through  all  the 
hundreds  of  names  and  kinds,  are  capitalistic 
enterprises,  based  not  on  essential  ethics  and 
inner  holiness,  but  on  inherited  dogmas,  per- 
sonal prejudices,  and  preferences  and  social 
affinities,  and  run  by  holding  of  property  and 
employment  of  agents  and  advertisement,  not 
worse  and  not  better  than  other  lines  of  enter- 
prise. Take  the  individual  Protestant  church, 
which  is  an  epitome,  an  example  in  petto,  of 
the  great  ecclesiastical  bodies.  The  ordinary 
denominational  local  church  is  a  kind  of  so- 
cial religious  club,  designed  to  secure  for  a 
few  the  comfort  and  culture  of  fine  music, 
eloquent  preaching,  pleasing  social  contact, 
and  esthetic  religiousness.  A  church  building 
is  not  "My  Father's  House,"  not  humanity's 
asylum,  not  the  refuge  of  penitence,  but  the 
possession  of  a  few,  even  pews  and  hymn 


ANTICHRIST  269 

books  being  personal  or  corporate  property, 
the  pastor  and  choir  corporate  selections,  the 
preaching  on  a  platform  conspicuously  made 
by  man.  If  you  do  not  like  the  combination, 
you  may  stay  away;  and  if,  liking  it,  you  re- 
fuse to  pay  the  dues,  you  might  just  as  well 
stay  away.  A  congregation  is  a  fraternity; 
you  must,  to  use  a  western  phrase,  "Put  up 
or—  "  be  uncomfortable.  Birds  of  a  feather 
flock  together;  birds  of  other  plumage  were 
better  elsewhere.  There  is  no  responsibility 
except  to  the  corporation. 

Pass  from  the  individual  church  to  its  de- 
nomination, or  to  any  larger  religious  federa- 
tion or  hierarchy,  the  same  is  true  with 
widening  of  barriers.  Originally  this  "per- 
suasion" sprang  out  of  some  dreary  situation 
of  feud,  persecution,  schism,  pride,  and  prej- 
udice ;  now  it  has  property,  endowments,  learn- 
ing, eloquence,  art,  esprit  de  corps,  and  fights 
other  persuasions  for  room  to  grow  and  to  rule. 
If  the  churches  are  corporations,  seeking  fra- 
ternal advantages,  the  denominations  are  trusts, 
massing  church  properties  and  influences. 


270    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

The  struggle  of  denominations  for  existence 
and  supremacy  is  disgraceful.  The  smallest 
hamlets  present  the  appearance  of  a  battle- 
ground, with  churches  militant  in  hostile 
camps.  Any  little  city,  say  of  ten  thousand 
inhabitants,  will  display  its  ten  or  fifteen 
church  edifices,  and  in  them  ten  or  fifteen 
highly  educated  clergymen,  preaching  each  to 
a  little  coterie  of  listeners.  These  expensively 
trained  clerics,  many  of  whom  would  gladly 
and  effectively  address  crowded  audiences, 
fritter  away  time  and  strength  in  an  endless 
routine  of  petty  duties  not  requiring  elaborate 
training.  In  this  city  will  perhaps  be  found 
missionary  churches  whose  only  purpose  is  to 
perpetuate  and  gratify  divisive  instincts — a 
French-Canadian  Congregational,  a  French- 
Canadian  Baptist,  a  Colored  Congregational, 
a  Colored  Methodist,  a  Colored  Presbyterian, 
and  so  on.  Possibly  many  thousands  of 
dollars  will  be  thrown  away  to  enable  a  few 
families  to  indulge  in  the  extravagance  of  sec- 
tarian prejudice  or  of  racial  seclusion,  the  while 
a  dozen  churches  about  them  are  half  empty. 


ANTICHRIST  271 

The  enormous  wastefulness  of  this  system 
renders  a  sharp  competition  for  patronage 
from  the  rich  inevitable,  ultimately  enslaves 
the  pews,  and  muzzles  very  effectively  the 
minister.  To  offer  superior  attractions  in 
pulpit,  choir,  and  elegance  of  house  of  wor- 
ship, and  social  entertainment,  becomes  the 
secret  of  good  church  management;  and,  in- 
stead of  sending  forth  a  great  sum  of  money 
to  sustain  charities  and  deserving  missions, 
the  rival  societies  barely  and  only  with  cer- 
tainty of  deficits,  which  their  rich  members 
must  make  good,  and  by  aid  of  fairs  and 
theatricals,  hold  their  own.  Not  to  win  souls 
but  to  secure  paying  pewholders  is  the  su- 
preme consideration — not  to  combine  for 
charity,  but  for  sufficient  revenue. 

A  study  of  the  various  resorts  to  turn  an 
honest  penny  by  offering  pleasing  entertain- 
ment would  throw  a  flood  of  light  upon  the 
extent  and  gravity  of  the  evil.  The  editor  of 
a  religious  journal  thus  recently  bewailed  the 
trials  of  the  churches  in  his  neighborhood: 
"They  have  raffled  for  crazy-quilts,  dipped 


272    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

into  grab-bags,  voted  for  the  handsomest  man 
or  for  the  most  popular  minister  in  town, 
offered  the  privilege  of  kissing  the  handsomest 
young  lady  in  the  hall  for  one  dollar  or  five 
dollars,  sold  cigars  at  the  hands  of  sweet  little 
girls,  offered  for  ten  cents  guesses  at  the  num- 
ber of  pins  in  a  cushion,  etc.,  until  they  are  at 
their  wits'  end  for  taking  resorts  in  raising 
money."  And  the  good  editor  suggested  a 
boxing-match  and  a  side  bar.  Indeed,  the 
author  knows  of  a  church  in  Jersey  City 
which  actually  bought  a  discarded  bar  and 
placed  it  in  their  entertainment  room  for 
temperance  drinks.  Said  the  pastor,  in  ex- 
planation: "It  makes  the  boys  feel  more  at 
home  here."  Even  this  is  not  so  bad  as  the 
course  of  a  certain  church,  of  high  sanctity,  in 
Springfield,  Mass.,  which  once  advertised  as 
an  inducement  to  attend  a  festival,  "Pretty 
waiter  girls!"  Elbert  Hubbard,  in  the  Inde- 
pendent, stated  that  in  his  village  of  East 
Aurora  there  are  seven  preachers  on  salaries 
of  from  four  hundred  to  nine  hundred  a  year. 
"Among  the  village  churches  there  is  more  or 


ANTICHRIST  273 

less  strife.  The  fires  of  hate  are  often  respec- 
tably banked,  but  the  embers  smolder,  and 
now  and  again  the  flame  bursts  out.  The 
churches  are  all  in  competition  with  each 
other.  Rivalry  is  rife,  and  the  spirit  of  the 
Master  is  smothered  in  a  scrimmage  to  'raise 
the  wind.'  Chicken-pie  sociables,  poverty 
parties,  guesses  as  to  the  number  of  pieces  in 
a  bed-quilt,  fairs,  maple-sugar  soirees,  and  all 
the  usual  round  of  petty  pious  blackmail  is  re- 
sorted to,  in  order  to  make  up  the  deficit. 
And  some  years  ago,  we  tried  the  plan  at  one 
of  our  churches  of  having  a  dozen  pretty 
young  women  take  off  their  shoes  and  stock- 
ings and  stand  behind  a  curtain  that  left  ex- 
posed only  their  pedals.  Then  we  paid  ten 
cents  each,  passed  by,  and  made  guesses  as  to 
the  owners  of  the  underpinning.  The  man 
who  made  the  highest  number  of  correct 
guesses  received  a  prize."  The  last  men- 
tioned feet-exposure  ingenuity  has  been  re- 
peated on  the  Pacific  Coast,  to  the  knowledge 
of  the  author. 

A  curious  and  significant  feature  of  the  sit- 

18 


274    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

uation  is  the  pitiful  cry  for  more  ministers. 
Young  men  are  exhorted  to  fling  themselves 
into  the  breach — as  heroes  to  lead  the  army 
of  God  against  the  World,  the  Flesh,  and  the 
Devil  ?  Not  at  all,  but  rather  that  each  little 
starveling  flock  may  have  a  shepherd  of  its 
own,  even  if  on  starvation  salary,  and,  in  the 
selection  of  the  victim,  to  be  able  to  choose 
and  to  reject.  Of  the  Congregational  minis- 
try, one-third  at  least  are  without  charge, 
though  in  good  and  regular  standing — pre- 
sumably, in  most  cases,  because  the  churches 
do  not  want  them — and  every  little  vacant 
parish  rejoices  in  a  list  of  available  candidates. 
"  Candidating"  has  become  a  vice — the  author 
calls  the  habit  "candidate  chewing"  —and  is 
inveterate  as  the  tobacco  or  morphine  habit. 
A  large  church  in  Holyoke,  Mass.,  once  upon 
a  time,  began  to  be  frightened  about  the 
vacancy  of  their  pulpit  and  diminishing 
congregation,  but  one  of  the  leaders  bade 
them  be  at  ease,  and  declared,  "Oh!  there 
are  lots  of  ministers;  the  woods  are  full 
of  them!"  And,  in  order  that  there  be 


ANTICHRIST  275 

lively  candidating,  the  woods  must  be  kept 
full  of  them. 

The  churches  are  not  in  any  conspicuous 
way  interested  in  humanitarian  work,  as 
church  members  are  too  heavily  laden  with 
denominational  and  local  expenditure  of  their 
own  to  give  much  to  outside  charities. 

In  short,  churches  are  capitalistic  enter- 
prises, run  on  commercial  lines  by  small  cor- 
porations, considered  locally,  or  in  great 
denominational  confederations  of  these,  by  the 
usual  methods  of  sharp  competition,  promo- 
tion, and  advertisement,  and  for  the  delecta- 
tion of  the  incorporators,  with  the  least  possible 
margin  for  disinterested  charity. 

The  result  is,  that  the  poor  are  practically 
shut  out,  while  the  church  life  itself,  absorbed 
in  the  awful  struggle  for  existence,  lacks  spir- 
ituality, evangelistic  energy,  and  humanitarian 
fervor.  There  is  much  talking,  preaching, 
and  praying  about  how  to  reach  the  MASSES 
(by  which  is  meant  the  class  of  wage-earners), 
and  these  masses  stand  afar  off  and  eye  the 
church  folk,  either  with  a  puzzled  helplessness 


276    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

in  understanding,  or  with  a  grin  of  amusement, 
or  with  a  scowl  of  wrath.  Over  the  door  of 
one  of  the  most  wealthy  and  palatial  of  the 
Fifth  Avenue  church  edifices  in  New  York 
City  is  carved  into  massive  stone  this  legend: 
"To  the  poor  the  Gospel  is  preached."  Some 
naughty  wag,  passing  by,  wrote  underneath, 
in  green  chalk,  "Only  not  here!" 

The  reader  must  not  understand  the  author 
as  belittling,  in  these  words,  the  essential 
righteousness  of  the  men  and  women  who 
make  up  the  various  religious  bodies.  He 
admits  that  in  this  local  and  denominational 
deadlock  of  energies  there  is  tied  up  tremen- 
dous moral  and  religious  power.  Samson  is 
blind  and  not  over-wise,  but  he  is  still  very 
strong.  The  problem  of  this  age  is  how  to 
correct  the  system  and  release  the  imprisoned 
forces.  Plenty  of  material  in  pulpit  and  pew 
is  at  hand  for  heroism  and  even  martyrdom, 
if  opportunity  only  offer. 

The  remedy  for  these  evils,  commonly  sug- 
gested by  Protestants,  is  consolidation  or  fed- 
eration of  denominations;  by  Catholics  the 


ANTICHRIST  277 

remedy  urged  is  reform  within  the  hier- 
archy. 

Consolidation  or  federation  of  denomina- 
tions is  quite  impracticable;  it  would  result 
in  an  aggravation  of  evils,  for  an  immense 
denominational  trust  would  appear,  cornering 
religion,  which  trust  might  cut  down  the  waste 
of  the  present  extravagance,  but  would  reestab- 
lish religious  intolerance  and  prove  even  more 
highly  offensive  to  the  class  of  wage-earners 
whose  defection  is  deplored.  Reform  within 
a  hierarchy  has  always  been  and  will  ever  be 
impossible  for  obvious  reasons. 

Relief  can  not  come  unless  Dogmatism, 
Ecclesiasticism,  and  Capitalism  alike  are  for- 
ever and  totally  abandoned.  If  you  would 
have  Christ,  execute  Antichrist. 

And  when  Dogmatism,  Ecclesiasticism,  and 
Capitalism  have  vanished,  what  will  remain? 
Nothing !  Everything ! 

There  will  abide  nothing  that  the  carnal 
heart  delights  in,  nothing  that  feeds  vanity, 
pride,  and  oppression,  nothing  of  pomp  or 
circumstance. 


278    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

But  there  will  continue  all  that  is  needful  to 
the  vision  of  the  Unseen  and  Eternal,  every- 
thing involved  in  the  sway  of  a  virtuous  life, 
everything  requisite  for  character  in  this  world 
and  preparation  for  the  world  to  come.  Creeds 
as  shibboleths,  priesthoods  in  hierarchy,  and 
wealth  as  plutocracy,  and  all  that  these  things 
imply,  generate  and  provoke,  will  have  become 
memories;  but  God  and  the  worshiper,  and 
song,  prayer,  and  praise,  and  alms,  and  for- 
giveness, and  charity  of  thought  and  deed,  will 
have  suffered  no  eclipse. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  INVISIBLE  AND  UNIVERSAL  KINGDOM 

T>UT  is  an  organized  Christendom  neces- 
sary for  the  utterance  of  a  Kingdom  of 
Righteousness  all  within  ?  Is  a  visible  church, 
incorporated  and  militant,  requisite  to  sway 
the  influence  of  a  Brotherhood,  who  are  un- 
seen, anywhere  and  everywhere  ? 

May  not  a  time  come  when  religion  shall 
need  no  creeds,  no  priests,  no  set-apart  edi- 
fices, no  ceremonial? 

Perhaps  we  may  throw  light  upon  this 
problem  by  considering,  in  suggestive  analogy, 
the  cases  of  those  cognate  departments  of 
human  feeling,  ethics  and  esthetics. 

Take  the  department  of  ethics  or  abstract 
morality.  Ethics,  as  a  sway  over  human  con- 
duct, has  never  needed  written  codes,  forms, 
and  rituals  since  it  has  abundantly  flourished 

279 


280    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

without.  Men  have  listened  to  the  voice  of 
conscience,  and  suffered  from  the  stings  of 
remorse,  in  all  lands  and  ages,  without  even 
tables  of  stone  and  Ten  Commandments. 
Customs  originate  morals,  the  requirements 
of  society  beget  duties,  and  conscience  re- 
sponds without  elaborate  machinery.  Public 
opinion  follows  the  guidance  of  individual 
wisdom  in  forming  ethical  judgments,  and 
individual  standards  bow  low  before  public 
opinion;  and,  while  ethical  culture  societies 
have  doubtless  done  good  work,  they  have 
reached  few  persons,  and  never  been  indis- 
pensable. Nothing  analogous  to  Christen- 
dom, or  the  Roman  hierarchy,  or  a  modern 
denomination  has  arisen,  in  this  realm,  and 
so  far  from  morals  having  been  guaranteed 
or  enforced  by  these  agencies,  ethics,  pure  and 
simple,  has  been  rather  divorced  from  all 
ecclesiasticism. 

The  same  is  true  of  esthetics.  When  and 
where,  in  the  history  of  Art,  have  hierarchy 
and  organization  of  artists  been  requisite  to 
appreciation  and  delineation  of  the  Beautiful  ? 


THE  KINGDOM  281 

Has  any  Artdom  rivalled  Christendom  in  com- 
pulsion and  punishment?  Does  the  world 
owe  Homer  or  Phidias  or  Raphael  to  some 
instituted  art  movement  ? 

It  is  true  that  both  ethics  and  esthetics  can 
be  taught,  and  have  been,  and  that  moralists 
and  artists  are  the  better  for  training,  and  that 
schools  for  both  have  existed  time  out  of  mind; 
but  neither  ethics  nor  esthetics  have  ever  been 
instituted  for  authoritative  sway  over  men, 
have  ever  been  guaranteed  by  priests,  pre- 
scribed in  symbols,  or  regulated  by  authority. 
Men,  in  considerable  numbers,  have  come 
true  to  their  appreciation  of  the  beautiful  in 
nature  and  the  Right  in  conduct — not  without 
argument,  opinion,  teaching,  controversy,  and 
influence,  but  without  dogmatism  and  without 
penalty. 

Now  wherein  is  religion  different  from  its 
sisters,  morality  and  art  ?  Is  it  in  its  essen- 
tials any  less  a  region  of  opinion  and  specula- 
tion ?  Will  it  come  by  compulsion  ?  Will  it 
go,  if  not  made  a  habit  under  penalty  ?  Is  it 
not  a  personal  matter  ?  Is  it  not  a  response  to 


282    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  Infinite  Spirit  made  by  the  inner  man? 
Forms  and  ceremonies  may  be  good  crutches 
for  the  weak  and  ignorant,  but  are  they  never 
to  be  cast  aside?  Is  the  Invisible  and  Uni- 
versal Kingdom  impotent  unless  cribbed, 
cabined,  and  confined  in  a  church,  a  denomina- 
tion, or  a  hierarchy  ?  Can  you  trust  men  less, 
in  their  reaction  to  the  touch  of  the  Infinite, 
than  in  their  answer  to  the  appeal  of  the  Beau- 
tiful and  their  obedience  to  the  compulsion  of 
social  obligation  ?  Suppose  we  could,  some- 
how, secure  devout  worship  of  God  and  loving 
ministration  for  men,  not  without  teaching, 
opinion,  and  influence,  but  without  priest- 
craft, dogmatism,  or  penalty — would  not  the 
whole  idea  of  Jesus  be  embodied  and  the 
whole  need  of  humanity  be  met  ? 

Nay,  hierarchies,  cathedrals,  rituals,  creeds, 
denominations,  choirs,  preachers,  confessions, 
and  protestations — would  the  heavens  fall,  if 
they  were  all  abandoned  and  forgotten  ? 

We  are  unable  to  answer  these  questions; 
but  it  does  appear  to  the  author,  in  his  wilder 
moments,  that  essential  religion  needs  no 


THE  KINGDOM  283 

bolstering  from  human  authority,  secures 
nothing  good  by  imposing  penalties,  and  finds 
real  utterance  only  in  sincere  personal  and 
social  worship,  and  humble  personal  and  col- 
lective altruism.  And  we  do  consider  our- 
selves on  very  firm  ground  in  urging  that 
those  who  would  follow  in  the  footsteps  of 
Jesus,  and  evolve  His  ideas  of  personal  and 
collective  righteousness,  must  walk  along  the 
following  paths. 

They  must  shorten  and  simplify  the  creeds 
until  these  cease  to  be  exclusive  of  any  earnest- 
ness, essentially  devout  and  sacrificial.  As 
Lord  Bacon  long  ago  said:  "Truth  is  the 
daughter  of  Time,  not  of  Authority." 

In  narrowing  the  creeds,  the  churches  ought 
to  broaden  their  ethical  horizon.  They  must 
realize  that  Capitalism,  with  its  intricate  sys- 
tem of  finance,  its  enormous  multiplication  of 
wealth,  and  highly  differentiated  organization 
of  society,  has  furnished  a  new  field  of  labor 
for  conscience,  and  a  new  range  of  application 
for  ethical  judgment. 


284    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

There  have  arisen  into  the  moral  vision  of 
men  many  novel,  very  atrocious,  and  yet  very 
insidious  kinds  of  wrongdoing,  as  adulteration 
of  manufactured  foods,  the  wrecking  of  rail- 
roads, the  despoiling  of  savings  banks,  insur- 
ance companies,  and  other  institutions  of 
trust,  or  the  erection  of  gigantic  sky-scraping 
monopolies,  founded  on  favoritism,  cemented 
with  the  life-blood  of  competitors,  promoted 
by  fraud,  bribery,  and  terror,  and  used  by 
remorseless  tyranny  for  its  own  further  enrich- 
ment. These  new  forms  of  depravity  are  fully 
as  harmful  to  the  transgressor,  and  to  the 
numberless  victims,  as  even  the  worst  out- 
breaks of  old-time  lust,  wrath,  greed,  and 
envy;  but  neither  the  doer  nor  the  suffering 
public  are  fully  awake  to  their  turpitude.  And 
what  concerns  us  in  our  theme,  momentously, 
through  the  unreadiness  of  conscience  to  react 
in  the  criminal,  and  through  the  blindness  of 
of  the  many  who  fail  even  to  discern  the  crime, 
often  the  churches  themselves  become  strong- 
holds of  iniquity,  eking  out  income  with 
the  contributions  of  the  devout  robber,  and 


THE  KINGDOM  285 

sometimes  soliciting  a  share  in  the  unholy 
spoils. 

This  situation  can  not  be  presented  in  more 
telling  description  than  by  Edward  Als worth 
Ross  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly  (May,  1905), 
who,  in  a  notable  article,  writes  as  fol- 
lows : 

"The  man  who  picks  pockets  with  a  rail- 
way rebate,  murders  with  an  adulterant  in- 
stead of  a  bludgeon,  burglarizes  with  a  rake-off 
instead  of  a  jimmy,  cheats  with  a  company 
prospectus  instead  of  a  deck  of  cards,  or 
scuttles  his  town  instead  of  his  ship,  does 
not  feel  on  his  brow  the  brand  of  a  male- 
factor. The  shedder  of  blood,  the  oppres- 
sor of  the  widow  and  the  fatherless,  long 
ago  became  odious;  but  latter-day  treach- 
eries fly  no  skull-and-crossbones  at  the  mast- 
head. .  .  . 

"How  decent  are  the  pale  slayings  of  the 
quack,  the  adulterator  and  the  purveyor  of 
polluted  water,  compared  with  the  red  slay- 
ings  of  the  bandit  or  assassin !  .  .  .  The  steal- 
ings and  slayings  that  lurk  in  the  complexities 


286    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

of  our  social  relations  are  not  deeds  of  the  dive, 
the  dark  alley,  the  lonely  road,  and  the  mid- 
night hour.  .  .  .  The  modern  high  power 
dealer  of  woe  wears  immaculate  linen,  carries 
a  silk  hat  and  a  lighted  cigar,  sins  with  a  calm 
countenance  and  a  serene  soul,  leagues  or 
months  from  the  evil  he  causes. 

"The  same  qualities  that  lull  the  conscience 
of  the  sinner  blind  the  eyes  of  onlookers. 
People  are  sentimental  and  bastinado  wrong- 
doing not  according  to  its  harmfulness,  but 
according  to  the  infamy  that  has  come  to  at- 
tach to  it.  Undiscerning,  they  chastise  with 
scorpions  the  old  authentic  sins,  but  spare  the 
new.  They  do  not  see  that  boodling  is  treason, 
that  blackmail  is  piracy,  that  embezzlement  is 
theft,  that  speculation  is  gambling,  that  tax- 
dodging  is  larceny,  that  railroad  discrimina- 
tion is  treachery,  that  the  factory  labor  of 
children  is  slavery,  that  deleterious  adultera- 
tion is  murder.  It  has  not  come  home  to  them 
that  the  fraudulent  promoter  '  devours  widows' 
houses,'  that  the  monopolist  'grinds  the  faces 
of  the  poor,'  that  mercenary  editors  and  spell- 


THE  KINGDOM  287 

binders  'put  bitter  for  sweet  and  sweet  for 
bitter.'.      ." 


The  churches  must  insist  that  our  clergy 
shall  not  be  a  dilettanti  professional  class  of 
orators,  but  men  of  action,  with  prophetic 
vision,  who  are  not  hired  to  preach  at  us  so 
much  as  supported  to  lead  us.  A  clergyman 
of  the  "  white-cravated "  sort,  who  perorates 
on  a  little  round  of  conventional  themes, 
mostly  remote  from  our  own  struggles  and 
failings,  "in  gracious  dew  of  pulpit  eloquence 
and  all  the  well-whipt  cream  of  courtly  sense," 
who  belabors  only  the  Turks,  the  Mormons, 
and  other  far-away  sinners,  and  who  flatters 
the  rascals  before  him  for  so  much  a  year, 
vacation  thrown  in,  is  of  no  use  whatever  to 
save  the  lost  or  better  the  world. 

The  churches  must  abolish  the  quartet 
choir:  for  most  evidently,  if  the  purpose  be 
worship,  nothing  can  be  plainer  than  that  the 
music  should  be  made  subjective  to  the  wor- 
shipers and  not  an  objective  exhibition  of 


288    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

fine  art.     The  pretty  soprano  must  go  with 
the  golden-mouthed  orator. 

We  must  unite  the  little  churches  into  big 
ones  by  breaking  down  barriers.  Away  with 
preferences  and  prejudices,  and  down  to 
essentials!  Two-thirds  of  the  church  edifices 
should  be  sold  and  at  least  one-half  of  the 
educated  ministers  and  priests  allowed  to 
seek  other  employment.  In  cities,  unite  all 
churches  of  the  same  name,  and  in  villages 
unite  churches  of  different  names  into  union 
parishes!  Cut  down  extravagance!  welcome 
the  poor! 

Lastly,  and  chiefly,  we  must  make  this  large 
church  a  mechanism  for  helping  the  hurt  of 
the  world.  Its  occupation  should  be  to  solve 
practically  the  social  problems  of  its  neighbor- 
hood, by  consecrated  wisdom,  and  by  personal 
sacrifice  and  ministration;  to  antagonize  vice 
and  crime  in  the  community,  and  to  secure  for 
every  child  or  youth  within  the  boundary  of 
the  parish  something  like  a  fair  chance  of  liv- 


THE  KINGDOM  289 

ing  unpolluted,  happy,  and  useful  lives.  The 
dear  old  chummy  church — how  the  carnal  man 
in  us  loves  it — the  dear  old  chummy  church, 
with  its  pulpit  eloquence,  its  artistic  music, 
its  well-groomed  congregation,  its  jolly  festi- 
vals, its  roguish  fairs,  its  saucy  Easter  bonnets, 
and  Christmas  merrymakings,  and  all  its  petty 
frivolity  and  aristocratic  pride,  must  go,  and  in 
its  place  must  come  a  union  of  the  unselfish  to 
voice  only  virtue,  humanity,  and  charity — to 
encourage  the  poor,  guide  the  feebleminded, 
restrain  the  unruly,  father  the  orphan,  right  the 
wronged,  rebuke  the  evil-doer,  scathe  hypoc- 
risy, stigmatize  pride,  and  defy  the  World, 
the  Flesh,  and  the  Devil !  The  church's  purity 
can  be  preserved,  not  by  formulas  for  signa- 
ture, but  only  by  an  atmosphere  vice  can  not 
breathe!  Hypocrisy  must  be  deprived  of  its 
cloak  by  offering  no  prizes  to  worldliness,  and 
the  brethren  kept  from  contact  with  pride  and 
folly  by  discarding  the  alliance  with  wealth, 
by  opening  pews  to  all,  "first  come,  first 
served,"  and  by  liberating  the  pulpit  from 
bondage  to  rich  sinners.  There  must  be  no 

19 


290    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

claim  of  special  sanctity  for  the  elect,  no  railing 
accusation  against  the  outsider. 

Such,  whether  we  follow  them  or  not,  are 
the  lines  of  progress  toward  the  ideals  of 
Jesus. 

And  perhaps — who  knows — a  time  may 
come  when,  creeds  having  become  evanescent, 
ecclesiastical  prejudices  vanished,  the  churches 
may  merge  into  enterprises  of  charity,  the 
Kingdom  itself  remaining,  what  it  has  ever 
been,  an  invisible  and  universal  brother- 
hood! 

But  all  this  may  take  aeons.  Never  mind. 
Bacon  said,  "The  old  age  of  time  is  the 
youth  of  the  world!"  The  Past  is  a  flitted 
dream,  the  future  endlessly  unrolls.  Things 
and  forms  and  men  die,  but  ideas  live.  God's 
law  of  progress  is  a  sublime  evolution,  scorn- 
ing aeons — it  is  from  original  fire-mist  of  the 
vacant  heavens  to  the  final  splendor  of  His 
Presence — that  is  to  say,  from  fire  to  life,  and 
from  life  to  genius,  from  savage  to  sage,  from 


THE  KINGDOM  291 

mortal  to  glorified  saint,  from  faith  to  sight, 
from  love  to  love,  from  grace  to  glory.  The 
Present  is  God's  Chariot :  we  may  be  sure  that 
He  holds  securely  in  His  hands  the  reins  of  the 
Future. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

THE  UNFINISHED  JESUS 

TN  the  generation  which  preceded  Raphael 
and  Michael  Angelo,  there  appeared  in 
Italy  a  man  of  universal  genius,  eminent  as  a 
mechanician,  an  engineer,  a  chemist,  a  geolo- 
gist, and  a  geographer;  he  was  the  most  dis- 
tinguished painter  of  his  time,  a  sculptor,  an 
architect,  a  musician,  and  a  critic.  He  painted 
on  a  wooden  shield  a  dragon  so  formidable  in 
aspect  that  all  who  beheld  it  shuddered:  he 
made  mechanical  birds,  a  walking  lion,  and  a 
lizard  with  rolling  eyes  and  wings,  which,  as 
they  rose  and  fell,  displayed  oscillating  quick- 
silver with  brilliant  effect.  He  invented  tools 
and  machines,  devised  canals  and  tunnels, 
steam-cannons  and  breach-loaders,  thus  an- 
ticipating many  great  discoveries.  He  was  so 
far  ahead  of  his  times  that  men  could  not  keep 
up  with  him,  so  that  his  inventions  and  dis- 


292 


THE  UNFINISHED  JESUS  293 

coveries,  too  vast  or  quite  out  of  even  uncom- 
mon sight,  soon  were  forgotten.  To  this  uni- 
versal genius  nothing  seemed  too  hard,  except 
to  paint  the  face  of  Jesus.  His  greatest  paint- 
ing was  the  "Last  Supper" — for  no  one  could 
be  alluded  to  in  the  above  terms  but  Leonardo 
da  Vinci — and  for  ten  years  he  labored  on  that 
great  mural  picture  on  the  wall  of  the  refectory 
at  Milan.  He  finished  it  easily — John,  Peter, 
and  Judas,  the  sop,  the  query,  the  rebuke  of 
the  traitor — all  but  the  face  of  the  Master, 
which  baffled  him;  for,  while  he  could  easily 
have  made  it  spiritual,  beautiful,  divine,  he 
was  puzzled  to  put  into  it  all  the  soul  of  Je- 
sus. His  genius  proved  insufficient,  and,  dis- 
couraged, at  last  he  abandoned  the  attempt. 
A  less  conscientious  hand  finished  the  work, 
and  the  Jesus  received  a  face,  such  as  it  was. 

Many  painters,  less  appreciative  or  more 
rash,  have  delineated  Jesus,  but  one  always 
turns  from  their  pictures  disappointed;  one 
expects  so  much,  and  it  somehow  is  not  all 
of  Jesus  we  behold. 

If  the  greatest  genius  has  failed,  may  not 


294    JESUS:  AN  UNFINISHED  PORTRAIT 

the  author  of  this  little  treatise  solace  himself 
if  he  let  fall  the  brush,  acknowledging  that 
over  his  feeble  outlines  the  imagination  and 
spirituality  of  the  reader  must  play,  to  warm 
and  ennoble  the  sketch  into  the  superlative 
original. 

Some  will  throw  aside  this  book  with  a  dis- 
appointment like  that  which  is  caused  in  the 
author's  mind  by  contemplation  of  the  face  in 
the  Milan  refectory,  which  Leonardo  dared 
not  paint  and  which  another  ventured.  So 
be  it!  The  author  is  pleased  that  he  has 
failed.  Thirty-five  years  he  has  mused  upon 
this  sublimest  and  most  beautiful  personality 
in  history,  and  now  the  attempted  portrayal 
will  dissatisfy  none  so  much  as  himself.  And 
his  only  comfort  is  the  thought  that  at  least 
one  mortal  man  baffles  description  and  tran- 
scends analysis. 

It  is  easy  to  cut  the  Gordian  knot  by  saying 
that  He  was  God  incarnate:  that  would  begin 
and  end  the  matter,  and  there  would  be  noth- 
ing to  wonder  at  and  nothing  to  explain;  then, 
superlative  qualities  of  mind  and  heart  would 


THE  UNFINISHED  JESUS  295 

be  matter  of  course,  quite  to  have  been  ex- 
pected, and  this  book  an  impertinence,  a  folly 
stupendous,  and  nothing  short  of  a  blasphemy. 
But  assuming  Him  to  be  a  veritable  man, 
inbreathed  of  the  Spirit  of  God,  yet  still  Him- 
self, humanity  appears  in  Him  expanding  in 
sublime  possibilities,  and  in  our  very  failure 
satisfactorily  to  analyze,  we  take  courage, 
aspire,  and  strive. 

We  leave  our  picture  of  Jesus,  like  Leo- 
nardo's, unfinished,  glad  that  we  partake  of 
His  humanity,  hopeful  for  our  own  personal 
enlargement,  hopeful  for  the  future  of  our 
race,  trusting  the  Spirit  of  divine  Wisdom 
and  Love  abroad  in  the  world,  and  breathing 
out  our  loyalty  to  the  Master,  dead  yet  ever 
living,  in  the  sweet  lines  of  Edmund  Spenser, 

"Oh,  blessed  Well  of  Love!    Oh,  Flowre  of  Grace! 

Oh,  glorious  Morning  Star!     Oh,  Lampe  of  Light! 
Most  lively  Image  of  thy  Father's  Face! 

Eternal  King  of  Glorie!    Lord  of  Light! 

Meeke  Lamb  of  God,  before  all  worlds  behight, 
How  can  we  thee  requite,  for  all  this  good! 
Or  what  can  prize  that  Thy  most  precious  Blood!" 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


JUN7 


'62  t 


JUN 


LD  21A-50m-3,'62 


General  Library 
IJnivertirv  of  California 


VB 


2860 


